He attended Wiley College in Texas briefly, where trumpeter Kenny Dorham was a fellow student.
In 1946, he backed Charlie Parker on such Dial classics as "A Night In Tunisia", "Yardbird Suite", "Ornithology" and the unfortunate recording of "Lover Man".
[3] Porter played on Los Angeles' Central Avenue with such bebop players as Dexter Gordon, Wardell Gray and Teddy Edwards, and in San Francisco with Hampton Hawes and Sonny Criss.
He organized and went on the road with a big band in 1949 that included Art Farmer, Jimmy Knepper and Eric Dolphy.
[4] During the 1950s, Porter was inactive as a jazz musician due to drug problems and returned to music only infrequently afterwards.