 He began in Los Angeles as a member of Les Hite's Orchestra in 1937.In the following 20 years he would work with Lionel Hampton, Woody Herman, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Wardell Gray, Stan Kenton and recording as a member of the Charles Mingus Octet, with Teo Macero, John Lewis and Kenny Clarke, among others, in 1953.He led ten albums, most of them recorded in Paris.