Giants of The Fest: Talented pianist and family man, Willie Tee

NEW ORLEANS (WGNO) — Every year Jazz Fest gives us a chance to salute the giants who made the festival what it is today, and the spotlight is on pianist and songwriter Willie Tee.

Wilson Turbinton was known on stage as Willie Tee and while he was quite the showman, his contributions to our music are unknown to some but not because Willie Tee didn’t possess the chops.

“He was so versatile that sometimes people don’t know where to box him or where to put him. Sometimes he was jazz, and sometimes he was R&B,” said Marilyn Turbinton, Tee’s wife.

Willie Tee burst onto the national scene in the 1960s with the R&B hit “Teasin You” which led to a string of hits, but his biggest contribution probably came from being the music mastermind of the Wild Magnolias Mardi Gras Indians. Up to that point, no one had recorded the songs of the Indians.

“Exactly, they were the first ones to put a band behind Mardi Gras Indians and a lot of people don’t realize that, and after they did it other Indian tribes started to do it,” said Turbinton.

In other words, Willie Tee was responsible for many of the tunes we hear during Mardi Gras. Willie also played the first jazz Fest in 1970 and was a constant presence at the fest for many years.

His daughter told WGNO what she thought of her dad’s greatest skill.

“I think production was his great talent in that, for example when he and I worked together and he produced the album on me, I wrote the melody and came up with the song or the concept of the song and once I would show it to him, he took it to another level,” said Roquel Turbinton Bruno, Tee’s daughter

Willie Tee passed away in 2007 and Racquel noted that what was also clear about her father, is that he loved his family and made time for them.

“He was an amazing dad. There are other sides of him besides music in that he was an avid golfer, and he was an amazing cook. Anything creative, he was all about it,” said Roquel Turbinton Bruno.

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