Kenneth 'Babyface' Edmonds Biography

Fast Facts

• Has won such awards for his charitable work as the Essence Award for Excellence and The City of Hope Award
• Personally helped raise over $500,000 for The Little Blue House, a transitional home in Washington D․C․, and donated $100,000 out of his own pocket to the VH-1 Save the Music program
• After Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston, he was the third to receive the BET Walk of Fame Award
• Received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2013
• Was honored by the National Council of Negro Women at the 2015 D․C․ Gala for Philanthropy
• Got married to Nicole Patenburg in 2014
• While he was a teen, he played with funk performer Bootsy Collins, who was the first to call him Babyface
• Quote: "For me, I just kind of pushed at what just seemed to come natural and it was just music and writing songs from a very early age that it just kind of stayed with me․"
• Quote: "A musician is kind of like what it comes down to, and a musician should be able to play more than one kind of music․"
• Has written hit R&B and Pop songs for Whitney Houston, Boys II Men, Beyoncé, Mariah Carey, Madonna, Eric Clapton, Mary J․ Blige, Michael Jackson, TLC, Toni Braxton, Celine Dion, John Mellon and many more
• Recorded 11 solo albums that explore love, romance and relationships and have influenced contemporary pop music
• Founded LaFace Records in 1989
• A 25-mile stretch of Interstate 65 that passes through Indianapolis was named Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds Highway in 1999
• In junior high, he and his friends used to bet each other that if they didn't do things like beat a car to a corner they would never make it as musicians