Leonard Niehaus (June 1, 1929 – May 28, 2020)[1] was an American alto saxophonist, composer and arranger on the West Coast jazz scene.

In 1946, after graduation from Roosevelt High School, Niehaus started to study music at Los Angeles City College later earning a music education degree from Los Angeles State College in 1951 as part of the school's first full graduating class.

Niehaus began his professional career arranging for and playing alto saxophone with Phil Carreón and His Orchestra in the Los Angeles area.

He would go on during that time to write and arrange music for entertainers acts such as the King Sisters, Mel Tormé, Dean Martin, and Carol Burnett.

Niehaus worked with Fielding on approximately seventy TV shows and films like Hogan's Heroes, Charlie’s Angels and McMillan & Wife.

The story of the film City Heat (1984) was set in the 1930s, so he wrote jazz of that period, hiring people like altoist Marshal Royal.

Niehaus won the BMI Film & TV Awards for Heartbreak Ridge (1986), Unforgiven (1992), The Bridges of Madison County (1995), and Space Cowboys (2000).

The most substantial collaboration between Niehaus and Eastwood which related directly to jazz was the 1988 biographical film on Charlie Parker, Bird.

[16] In addition to his film scores and orchestrations, Niehaus spent his final years playing with jazz combos in the Los Angeles area.