- A talented composer as well as performer, he wrote many songs that have since become standards, including "Strangers in the Night", "Danke Schoen", and "Spanish Eyes".
- Although almost all of his best-known recordings featured a trumpet lead, it is ironic that Kaempfert, although a talented multi-instrumentalist, could not play trumpet. The trumpet solos on his recordings were by either Charles Tabor or Fred Moch, both of whom received credit for doing so on Kaempfert's albums.
- One of the icons of "elevator/dentist office/supermarket music," he was one of the top-selling instrumental artists of the 1960s. In addition to having a number-one U.S. single with "Wonderland By Night" in 1960, his best-selling albums, all released in the U.S. by American Decca (now MCA) include: "The Magic Music of Far Away Places," "Blue Midnight," "Three O'Clock in the Morning," "Strangers in the Night," "That Happy Feeling," "Warm and Wonderful," "My Way of Life," "Christmas Wonderland," and, perhaps inevitably, "Bert Kaempfert's Greatest Hits."
- Was producer of The Beatles' first recordings in 1961, for Polydor, when they were still making a name for themselves on the small German nightclub circuit.
- Jackie Gleason, a fan of Kaempfert's, invited him to make his US TV debut on Gleason's show in 1967. The episode itself, telecast Christmas week of that year, drew some of the highest ratings in the show's history.
- Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1993.
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