http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wK-b5PLhrEI
Henry Mancini wrote it... and won a grammy for it.  It wasn't released as a single however

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX9UcnDzv2Q

Ray Anthony - had the highest charting version I know of

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAEbX5gY3QM

Duanne Eddy had a smallish but memorable turn with it as well...

It seems funny to downplay Mancini's version, as he wrote it, but both Ray Anthony and Duanne Eddy's versions seemed to really breath some life into the song... I don't think I can choose between those two versions as I like them both.

Out of those classic versions, I'd say the Mancini original.

The version that seems to get the most use in today's times is the excellent 1986 version by Art of Noise featuring Duane Eddy.  It unfortunately failed to see the US Top 40 (only reached #50), but it did reach #8 in the UK and #14 in Canada. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IECx1daPRe0

Art of Noise also cleverly sampled their version on their 1988 cover of the Prince song 'Kiss'. 

My opinion is biased, that I know but Emerson Lake & Palmer does an excellent cover of this tune. Unfortunatly I can't
find a video of it without some dope talking over or just sampling it, Oh well.

Strange how a lot of Mancini's tunes always seemed to end up as a bigger success in the hands of someone else...think 'Moon River'...

Duane Eddy's is the foremost version...rather incredible as his was a big hit in Britain before the TV show was even aired!

My opinion is biased, that I know but Emerson Lake & Palmer does an excellent cover of this tune. Unfortunatly I can't
find a video of it without some dope talking over or just sampling it, Oh well.


I kinda liked 2 Many DJs' rehash of it as the introduction to one of their hour-long epic mixes.  I also enjoyed ELP's version, of which I've linked to a small excerpt.

For completeness, here's the Blues Brothers:

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As for the original question:

Professional opinion: Here's one very close to the Ray Anthony version, but with higher-quality audio:

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Personal opinion, ca. 80s: I'll go with Art of Noise feat. Duane Eddy, specifically the 7:30 Peter Gunn (Twang Mix), with funky stereo effects at around 2:30 that appear in no other AoN remix of the track.

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I will neither confirm nor deny using the "Oh, you don't think I should do one more?" bit in the AoN version as an excuse to hit "pause" on a tape deck, move the needle back a bit, and fill both sides of a C-60 tape.  I will also neither confirm nor deny spending hours figuring out exactly how to make sure that - at least in the auto-reversing deck I had in the old Foomobile - that it would flip without missing a beat.  (Coincidentally, the amount of time it took to say "Oh, you don't think I should do one more?" was just about the amount of time it took a cassette tape deck to reach the end of the tape and reverse direction).  Best background music for late-night city driving evar.

But I digress.  I went with AoN as my personal choice only because we lacked the technology to get a good recording of the "original" from the 1983 arcade game Spy Hunter:

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Relevant bit of the review (for purposes of this thread) is at 4:25 onwards -- the original plan was to use the James Bond theme, but Midway couldn't get the rights.  So Spy Hunter brought the Peter Gunn theme back to pop culture, Art of Noise picked it up from there, and the rest was history.

Finally, no Peter Gunn thread would be complete without Sarah Vaughn's epic (modern) take on it:

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Yup, it's even got lyrics.

I remember the one used in Spy Hunter.  That music made that game even more awesome.