Henry Mancini was opened as a division of the Lincoln Park Performing Arts Center. The Center is located in Midland, Pennsylvania, minutes away from Mancini's hometown of Aliquippa. The Henry Mancini Arts Academy is an evening-and-weekend performing arts program for children from pre-K to grade 12, with some classes also available for adults. The program includes dance, voice, musical theater, and instrumental lessons. The American Film Institute ranked Mancini's songs "Moon River" in the No. 4 and "Days of Wine and Roses" in No. 39 on their list of the greatest songs and his score for "The Pink Panther" No. 20 on
Henry Mancini Came from Outer Space", "Tarantula", "This Island Earth", "The Glenn Miller Story" (for which he received his first Academy Award nomination), "The Benny Goodman Story" and Orson Welles' "Touch of Evil". During this time, he also wrote some popular songs. His first hit was a single by Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians titled "I Won't Let You Out of My Heart". Mancini left Universal-International to work as an independent composer/arranger in 1958. Soon afterward, he scored the television series "Peter Gunn" for writer/producer Blake Edwards. This was the genesis of a relationship in which Edwards and Mancini collaborated on