Clayton Joseph Chenier is the son of the King of Zydeco, the late Clifton Chenier, but, growing up in Port Arthur, Texas, where he was born in 1957, he had only occasional contact with his father, who lived with his wife in Lafayette. As a teenager, C.J. Thompson, as he was known then, going by his mother's last name, had little interest in zydeco. He was, however, a talented musician who played saxophone and keyboard, so that in 1978 when his father needed a sax player to fill in on a long road tour, he called on his son.

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