[1] Like his fellow Sun Ra bandmates, John Gilmore and Pat Patrick, Boykins attended Chicago's DuSable High School and studied under its famed music teacher "Captain" Walter Dyett.
9 Take Off for Planet Venus" from 1960 may be the first recorded example of the bass being played in a horn-like manner within a relatively free context, predating similar work by Alan Silva and David Izenzon.
[2] In 1962, Boykins recorded with the hard bop tenor saxophonist Bill Barron and, the next year, with pianist Elmo Hope.
[5] In the '70s, Boykins played with the Melodic Art-Tet, a cooperative free jazz ensemble that also included drummer Roger Blank, saxophonist Charles Brackeen, and trumpeter Ahmed Abdullah.
Reviewer Jerry D'Souza wrote: "Boykins made just one record as leader, but it marks his place as an adventurous bassist and a composer with a gift for style and genre.