From the beginning of his professional career, Marty Paich also learned music in the time-honored ways: he transcribed tunes and charts from recordings, he attended concerts, and he sat-in on a jams. After finishing his formal studies, Paich took a series of jobs in the Los Angeles music and recording industry. These included arranging (and playing) the score for the Disney Studio’s full-length animated film Lady and the Tramp, working as accompanist for vocalist Peggy Lee, playing piano for Shorty Rogers’ Giants, touring with Dorothy Dandridge, and providing arrangements for many local bands in Los Angeles. During the 1950s, Marty Paich was active in West coast jazz performance while also working intensively in the studios. He not only played on, but arranged and produced, numerous West Coast jazz recordings, including albums by Ray Brown, Ella Fitzgerald, Terry Gibbs, Stan Kenton, Shelly Manne, Pete Jolly, Anita O’Day, Dave Pell, Art Pepper, Buddy Rich, Shorty Rogers, Dan Terry, Toni Harper and Mel Tormé. His professional and personal association with Tormé, though occasionally a difficult one, would last decades. Many jazz critics feel their work with the Marty Paich Dektette to be the high point of their respective careers. In the 1960s, he became more active in commercial music, and extended his talents to include work for such pop musicians as Andy Williams, Al Hirt, Dinah Shore, and Jack Jones. His orchestrations for the American band Spirit incorporated use of symphonic arrangements into their albums Spirit, The Family That Plays Together, Model Shop (soundtrack album for the Jacques Demy film of the same name), and Clear. From the late 1960s into the mid-1970s, Paich was the studio orchestra leader for such television variety shows as The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (where he replaced Nelson Riddle), and The Sonny and Cher Show. He also scored such television programs as Ironside, for which he won an Emmy Award. At this time, he began serving as teacher and lifelong mentor to his son, David Paich, soon to make his own reputation with the band Toto, and to become a distinguished musician in his own right. In the late part of his career, his students included the film composer James Newton Howard and the conductor Charles Barber. Marty Paich died of colon cancer on August 12, 1995, aged 70, at his home on Baseline Road in Santa Ynez, California. He was survived by his brother Tom, second wife Linda, and his children, Lorrie (Cohen) and David Paich.