[1] After working as an arranger and composer for swing bands, he developed his own style of easy listening music, known as exotica and scored over 250 radio, television and motion pictures numbers.

At the age of 23 he joined Mel Tormé's Mel-Tones, singing on Artie Shaw records such as "What Is This Thing Called Love?"

With his own orchestra, he released a number of hits including "Ruby" (1953), "Unchained Melody" (1955), and "The Poor People of Paris" (1956), and is remembered for a version of "Sinner Man" (1956), definitively setting the sound with varying tempos, orchestral flourishes, and wailing background vocals.

[4] He also achieved success with concept albums of his own orchestral suites: Le Sacre Du Sauvage, Festival Of The Gnomes, Ports Of Pleasure, and Brazil Now, the first three for Capitol and the fourth on Gene Norman's Crescendo label.

[citation needed] In the 1960s, he formed Les Baxter's Balladeers, a conservative folk group in suits that at one time featured a young David Crosby.

They had a minor hit in 1967 with their song "The River Is Wide" which implemented the Wall of Sound technique originally developed by Phil Spector.

He also composed a new score for the theatrical release of the 1970 horror film Cry of the Banshee after AIP rejected Wilfred Josephs's original one.

Howard W. Koch recalled that Baxter composed, orchestrated and recorded the entire score of The Yellow Tomahawk (1954) in a total of three hours for $5,000.

[10] Furthermore, the Les Baxter papers, which are housed at the University of Arizona, show a significant number of arrangements in his own hand.