Known variously as The Boss of the Blues, and Big Joe Turner (due to his 6'2", 300+ lbs stature), Turner was born in Kansas City. His father was killed in a train accident when Joe was only four years old. He first discovered a love of music by involvement with his church. He began singing on street corners for money, quitting school at age fourteen to begin working in Kansas City's nightclubs, first as a cook, and later as a singing bartender. He became known eventually as The Singing Barman, and worked in such venues as The Kingfish Club and The Sunset, where he and his piano playing partner Pete Johnson became resident performers. The Sunset was managed by Piney Brown. It featured "separate but equal" facilities for caucasian patrons. Turner wrote "Piney Brown Blues" in his honor and sang it throughout his entire career.

At that time Kansas City nightclubs were subject to frequent raids by the police, but as Turner recounts, "The Boss man would have his bondsmen down at the police station before we got there. We'd walk in, sign our names and walk right out. Then we would cabaret until morning".

His partnership with boogie-woogie pianist Pete Johnson proved fruitful. Together they went to New York City during 1936, where they appeared on a playbill with Benny Goodman, but as Turner recounts, "After our show with Goodman, we auditioned at several places, but New York wasn't ready for us yet, so we headed back to K.C.". Eventually they were witnessed by the talent scout, John H. Hammond during 1938, who invited them back to New York to appear in one of his "From Spirituals to Swing" concerts at Carnegie Hall, which were instrumental in introducing jazz and blues to a wider American audience.

Due in part to their appearance at Carnegie Hall, Turner and Johnson had a major success with the song "Roll 'Em Pete". The track, basically a collection of traditional blues lyrics featured one of the earliest recorded examples of a back beat. It was a song which Turner recorded many times, with various combinations of musicians, during the ensuing years.

During 1939, along with boogie players Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis, they began a residency at Café Society, a nightclub in New York City, where they appeared on the same playbill as Billie Holiday and Frank Newton's band. Besides "Roll 'Em, Pete", Turner's best-known recordings from this period are probably "Cherry Red", "I Want A Little Girl" and "Wee Baby Blues". "Cherry Red" was recorded during 1939 for the Vocalion label, with Hot Lips Page on trumpet and a full band in attendance. The next year Turner contracted with Decca and recorded, "Piney Brown Blues", with Johnson on piano accompaniment. But not all of Turner's Decca recordings teamed him with Johnson; Willie "The Lion" Smith accompanied him on "Careless Love", while Freddie Slack's Trio provided the backing for "Rocks in My Bed" (1941).

During 1941, he went to Los Angeles where he performed in Duke Ellington's revue Jump for Joy in Hollywood. He appeared as a singing policeman in a comedy sketch named "He's on the Beat". Los Angeles became his home for a time, and during 1944 he worked in Meade Lux Lewis's Soundies musical movies. Although he sang on the soundtrack recordings, he was not present for the filming, and his vocals were mouthed by comedian Dudley Dickerson for the camera. During 1945 Turner and Pete Johnson established their own bar in Los Angeles, The Blue Moon Club.

The same year he contracted with National Records company, and recorded under Herb Abramson's supervision. His first national Rhythm&Blues success came during 1945 with a version of Saunders King's "S.K. Blues". He recorded the songs "My Gal's A Jockey" and the risqué "Around The Clock" the same year, and the Aladdin company released his duet with Wynonie Harris, on the ribald two-parter, "Battle of the Blues." Turner remained with National until 1947, but none of his records were great sellers. During 1950, he released the song "Still in the Dark" with Freedom Records company.

Turner made many record albums, not only with Johnson but with the pianists Art Tatum and Sammy Price and with various small jazz ensembles. He recorded with several recording companies and also performed with the Count Basie Orchestra. During his career, Turner was part of the transition from big bands to jump blues to rhythm and blues, and finally to rock and roll. Turner was a master of traditional blues verses and at the legendary Kansas City jam sessions he could swap choruses with instrumental soloists for hours.

During 1951, while performing with the Count Basie Orchestra at Harlem's Apollo Theater as a replacement for Jimmy Rushing, he was spotted by Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegün, who contracted him with their new recording company, Atlantic Records. Turner recorded a number of successes for them, including the blues standards, "Chains of Love" and "Sweet Sixteen". Many of his vocals are punctuated with shouts to the band members, as for the songs "Boogie Woogie Country Girl" ("That's a good rockin' band!", "Go ahead, man! Ow! That's just what I need!" ) and "Honey Hush" (he repeatedly sings "Hi-yo, Silver!", probably in reference to The Treniers singing the phrase for their Lone Ranger parody "Ride, Red, Ride"). Turner's records scored at the top of the rhythm-and-blues charts; although they were sometimes so risque' that some radio stations would not play them, the songs received much play on jukeboxes and records.

Turner had a great success during 1954 with "Shake, Rattle and Roll", which not only enhanced his career, turning him into a teenage favorite, but also helped to transform popular music. During the song, Turner yells at his woman to "get outa that bed, wash yo' face an' hands" and comments that she's "wearin' those dresses, the sun comes shinin' through!, I can't believe my eyes, all that mess belongs to you." He sang the number on film for the 1955 theatrical feature Rhythm and Blues Revue.

Although the cover version of the song by Bill Haley and His Comets, with the risqué lyrics omitted partially, was a greater success, many listeners sought out Turner's version and were introduced thereby to rhythm and blues. Elvis Presley showed he needed no such introduction. Presley's version of "Shake, Rattle and Roll" combined Turner's lyrics with Haley's arrangement, but was not successful as a single.

Suddenly, at the age of 43, Turner was a rock music singer. His follow-ups "Well All Right," "Flip Flop and Fly" (1955), "Hide and Seek," "Morning, Noon and Night," and "The Chicken and the Hawk" were all successful. He performed on the television program Showtime at the Apollo during the mid-1950s, and in the movie, Shake Rattle & Rock! (1956).

The song "Corrine, Corrina" was another great seller during 1956. In addition to the rock music songs he found time to release the classic Boss of the Blues album during 1956. On May 26, 1958, "(I’m Gonna) Jump for Joy," the twentieth and last of Turner's successes, entered the US R&B record chart.

After a number of successes in this vein, Turner quit popular music and resumed performing as a singer with small jazz combos, recording numerous albums with that style during the 1960s and 1970s. During 1966, Bill Haley helped revive Turner's career by lending him the Comets for a series of popular recordings in Mexico (apparently no one thought of getting the two to record a duet of "Shake, Rattle and Roll", as no such recording has yet surfaced). During 1977 he recorded a cover version of Guitar Slim's song, "The Things That I Used to Do".

During the 1960s and 1970s he resumed performing jazz and blues music, performing at many music festivals and recording for the impresario Norman Granz's company Pablo Records, once with his friendly rival, Jimmy Witherspoon. He also worked with the German boogie-woogie pianist Axel Zwingenberger. Turner also participated with good natured 'Battles of the Blues' with Wynonie Harris and T-Bone Walker.

He won the Esquire magazine award for male vocalist during 1945, the Melody Maker award for best 'new' vocalist during 1956, and the British Jazz Journal award as top male singer during 1965. During 1977, Turner recorded "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter" for Spivey Records company, featuring Lloyd Glenn on piano. Turner's career endured from the bar rooms of Kansas City during the 1920s (at the age of twelve when he performed with a pencilled moustache and his father's hat), to European jazz music festivals of the 1980s.

During 1983, only two years before his death, Turner was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. The same year the album Blues Train was released by Mute Records company; the album had Turner paired with the team Roomful of Blues. Turner also receives top billing with Count Basie in the Kansas City jazz reunion movie The Last of the Blue Devils (1979) which also features Jay McShann, Jimmy Forrest, and other players from the city.

He died in Inglewood, California during November 1985, at the age of 74 of heart failure, having suffered the earlier effects of arthritis, a stroke and diabetes. Big Joe Turner was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame during 1987.

The late The New York Times music critic Robert Palmer, said: "...his voice, pushing like a Count Basie solo, rich and grainy as a section of saxophones, which dominated the room with the sheer sumptuousness of its sound."

In announcing Turner's death in their December 1985 edition, the British music magazine, NME, described Turner as "the grandfather of rock and roll."

Bob Dylan referenced Turner in the song "High Water (For Charley Patton)", from his 2001 album Love and Theft. Songwriter Dave Alvin wrote a song about an evening that he spent with Turner titled "Boss Of The Blues". It was on his 2009 release, Dave Alvin & The Guilty Women. Alvin discussed the song in Issue 59 of The Blasters Newsletter.

Tracks marked as † were million selling discs.