[1] Mitchell would go on to play in big bands for Harry James, Buddy Rich and Pérez Prado, among others, as well as the NBC Symphony Orchestra.
In the 1960s, Mitchell joined The Wrecking Crew, a group of studio and session musicians who played anonymously on many records for popular singers of the time, as well as television theme songs, film scores, and advertising jingles.
[1] In 1995, Mitchell and his wife Nancy moved from Los Angeles to Puako, Hawaii, where he founded the Horns.
In 2010, Mitchell published his memoir, Lost, But Making Good Time: A View from the Back Row of the Band.
According to his wife, he stopped playing the trumpet toward the end of his life, due to macular degeneration and hand problems from an automobile accident.