Booker T Jones

Booker Taliaferro Jones Jr. (born November 12, 1944) is an American musician, songwriter, record producer and arranger, best known as the frontman of the band Booker T. & the M.G.'s. He has also worked as a session musician with many well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, earning him a Grammy Award for Lifetime Achievement.

With the death of guitarist Steve Cropper on December 3, 2025, Jones is the last surviving original member of Booker T. & the M.G.’s.

Jones was born in Memphis, Tennessee, on November 12, 1944. He was named after his father, Booker T. Jones Sr., who was named in honor of Booker T. Washington, the educator. Jones Sr. was a science teacher at Memphis High School, providing the family with a relatively stable, lower middle-class lifestyle.

Jones was musically a child prodigy, playing the oboe, saxophone, trombone, double bass, and piano at school and organ at church. Jones attended Booker T. Washington High School, the alma mater of Rufus Thomas, and collaborated with future stars like Isaac Hayes's writing partner David Porter, saxophonist Andrew Love of the Memphis Horns, soul singer/songwriter William Bell, and Earth, Wind & Fire's singer/songwriter Maurice White.

Jones's entry into professional music came at the age of 16, when he played baritone saxophone on Satellite (soon to be Stax) Records' first hit, "Cause I Love You", by Carla and Rufus Thomas. Willie Mitchell hired Jones for his band, in which Jones started on sax and later moved to bass. It was here that he met Al Jackson Jr., whom he brought to Stax. Simultaneously, Jones formed a combo with Maurice White and David Porter, in which he played guitar.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.