Another legend is gone.

Buckwheat Zydeco, one of the most prominent voices in all of Zydeco music, has passed away at the age of 68. He died around 1:30am Saturday morning at Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center in Lafayette following a lengthy battle with lung cancer.

Buckwheat was born Stanley Dural, Jr. on November 14, 1947 in Lafayette. He actually took his name from the Little Rascals character of the same name because he resembled him.

Although his father was a Creole accordion player, Dural started his music career playing organ in rhythm and blues bands in the area.

By the 1960s, Dural would be backing some of the biggest names in black music at the time, including Joe Tex and Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. He would then spend several years fronting his own funk band, but would go on to join Clifton Chenier's band as an organist in the mid-1970s.

Chenier later taught Dural how to play accordion. And in 1979, Dural left Chenier's band to front his own Zydeco band, Buckwheat Zydeco and the Ils Sont Partis Band.

Dural's career went heights that no other Zydeco musician had achieved up until that time. In 1987, he signed with Island Records, becoming the first Zydeco act to sign with a major record label.

From there, Dural's music landed in movies such as The Big Easy and on television programs such as The Late Show with David Letterman and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.

He even recorded and performed on stage with the likes of Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Paul Simon, and Willie Nelson, to name a few.

Survivors include his wife, Bernite Dural, sons Sir Reginald M. Dural (who played  in his band) and Stanley Paul Dural III, and daughters April Germain Dural, Stacie Durham and Tomorrow Lynn Dural.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

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