[2] At the age of 13, he played trumpet with Jimmy Witherspoon,[1][3] and later formed a band, the Jam Jivers, with fellow students Coleman and Prince Lasha.
[3] Moffett served in the United States Navy, after which he pursued boxing before studying music at Huston-Tillotson College in Austin.
[1] Moffett worked with Sonny Rollins, appeared on Archie Shepp's album Four for Trane, and led a group that included Pharoah Sanders and Carla Bley.
Moffett began teaching music at New York Public Schools as a way to make ends meet when Coleman made only sporadic performances.
Moffett moved to Oakland, California, where he served as the city's music director, and was later the principal of the alternative Odyssey public school in Berkeley in the mid-1970s.