He began his musical career within 1922 as a drummer in Kansas City, Missouri. From either 1926 to 1938 he worked as a pianist, typically accompanying Big Joe Turner. Around 1938 he and Turner appeared in the Negro spiritual to Swing concert at Carnegie Hall. This concert began a boogie-boogie craze, & Turner & deuce more performing artist at the concert, Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons, worked together afterwards at Café Society for a long instance; it too toured & recorded together.

Around 1950 he moved to Buffalo, New York but, despite problems by using his health, continued to tour & record, notably with Jimmy Rushing, Turner, and Jazz at the Philharmonic.