Earl Turbinton

File:New Orleans Music late 1950s - "The Basis for the Blast".jpg party, c. 1957]]

Turbinton worked as a session musician for local R&B recordings from the late 1950s. He became involved with the New Orleans jazz scene early in his career, and became involved with a New Orleans project called Jazz Workshop, which gave music lessons to children and had its own club. Though it closed after a short time, Turbinton had intended for it to serve a place in the city's musical life analogous to that of Preservation Hall, but for newer jazz styles.Gary W. Kennedy, "Earl Turbinton". The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz. 2nd edition, ed. Barry Kernfeld

Turbinton worked extensively in soul and R&B idioms in the 1960s, playing studio dates in New York, Detroit, and Los Angeles. He played alongside his brother, Willie Tee, in the funk group The Gaturs, and toured with Jerry Butler, the Four Tops, B. B. King, The Supremes, and The Temptations. In jazz, he worked with Joe Zawinul and Buster Williams in the 1970s.

Turbinton took the name "The African Cowboy" in the 1980s as a protest against Reagan administration attempts to cut federal arts funding.

Turbinton died in 2007 after a stroke, heart attack, and a bout with cancer. He was funeralized at Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church in New Orleans.{{Cite web |last=Maloney |first=Ann |date=2007-08-08 |title=Jazz great Earl Turbinton dead at 65 |url=https://www.nola.com/entertainment_life/jazz-great-earl-turbinton-dead-at-65/article_7db2f050-8b14-5b45-ab62-d11d728776e7.html |access-date=2023-12-12 |website=NOLA.com |language=en}}

• Brothers for Life, with Willie Tee (Rounder Records, 1987)
• Dominion and Sustenance (Prog Records, 1998)

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Category:American jazz saxophonists

Category:American male saxophonists

Category:Jazz musicians from New Orleans

Category:American male jazz musicians

Category:African-American Catholics