He studied the bass with Donald Raphael Garrett (John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, Roland Kirk) and Malachi Favors (Art Ensemble of Chicago).
In 1985, after moving to New York, Tyler joined the Sun Ra Arkestra and toured extensively through Europe & Japan and recorded two albums with them.
He joined Jon Hendricks' European Tour in 1990 and recorded Freddie Freeloader on the DENON Jazz label with Stanley Turrentine, Wynton Marsalis, among others.
[1] In 1992, he played on Grammy Award winning jazz vocalist Shirley Horn's recording Light Out of Darkness (A Tribute to Ray Charles), which received 4/5 Stars on AllMusic.
[2] In 1997, Mitchell continued to play with free jazz icon and Coltrane drummer Rashied Ali, Billy Bang, Jason Lindner, Frank Lowe, Larry Goldings amongst others.