 Pop/R&B recording artist Kenny Lattimore was raised in a family where "everybody -- my mother, father, grandparents -- were musically inclined." Lattimore's early musical diet included disparate sounds from gospel to R&B, including the Stylistics' "Stone In Love With You," which, at age five, he remembers making his own. "I loved that song! I sang it for anyone who would listen." Chaka Khan, whom Lattimore met when he was eight years old, was an early major influence, as were Earth, Wind & Fire, Aretha Franklin and Marvin Winans of the Winans Family gospel group. By age 10, Kenny was wowing the neighborhood with his innate vocal ability, which his family encouraged with vocal lessons. At a junior high school talent show he brought down the house with a rendition of Slave's funky "Watching You." However, despite a clear love for all types of music (in high school he studied classical and chamber genres, learned to sight-read music and cut his share of four-track recordings with R&B garage bands), when Lattimore enrolled in Washington's Howard University, he majored in architecture and planning. During his first year at Howard, Lattimore became a member of a fledging group, Maniquin. The band landed a deal with Epic in 1987 and when its debut LP was to be released two years later, Lattimore and company braced themselves for stardom. Instead, the group found itself on the almighty "chitlin' circuit" and the touring ritual of countless one-night-stand performances. "I can laugh about it now, but back then it was rough," Lattimore recalls. "We opened for a lot of different people... Guy, the Bar-Kays. We played Country and Western bars, family reunions, you name it." However, it was during this formative period that Lattimore developed his smooth stage ability and learned how to use his voice in live performance. Kenny left Maniquin in 1990. Aiming for a new challenge and creative independence, he stepped up his songwriting activity and had tunes recorded by R&B artists Glenn Jones and Jon Lucien. During this period he also began working with Dem Twinzz, a sibling songwriting/production team, again singing on demos ("That's how all my musical situations began, with me singing on people's demos.") Again, there was major-label interest, but this time, frustrated with the politics of the situation, in 1993 Lattimore decided instead to re-locate to New York City. Once in Manhattan, Kenny lived on his credit cards before recording a that included songs co-written by Lattimore and produced by J. Dibbs. Among the tracks cut was "Where Did Love Go," which ultimately made Lattimore's self-titled debut album, released in 1996 on Columbia Records.
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