Henry Mancini's adventurous score for the 1962 thriller Experiment in Terror is one of the composer's many classic collaborations with director Blake Edwards. Released a year after Breakfast at Tiffany's and a year before The Pink Panther, it's a must for any level of Mancini collector, not because it's so representative of his work at the time but because it's extra quirky and diverse -- with jazzy lounge pieces, melancholy piano, and eerie suspense passages, as well as guitar rock ("Golden Gate Twist") and even a nod to the flapper era with the "Charleston"-like "The Good Old Days." The score was recorded earlier that year at RCA Victor's Music Center of the World by Henry Mancini & His Orchestra. ~ Marcy Donelson