"Grammy Award winner and standout R&B singer Van Hunt has spent a great chunk of his life writing and playing music, and the Midwesterner has crooned and swooned his way to contemporary R&B fame, starting with the soul music he'd been creating for years before he struck gold in the music industry.Hunt's strange childhood is partly to credit for his wide range in musical taste. Growing up influenced by a father who was a ""part-time painter/part-time pimp"" and a mother who supported the artist's musical inclinations from childhood, Hunt grew up in a diverse setting in Southern Ohio. Relocating from the Midwest to the Dirty South in his twenties, Hunt spent a few years in Atlanta attending Morehouse College, where he furthered his abilities and desires to play the guitar and write music. Eventually scoring a gig as a songwriter for soul artists Joi, Raphael Saadiq and Dionne Farris while working with producer Dallas Austin and manager (pre-American Idol) Randy Jackson, Hunt earned the fame of his early career through these means before branching out as a solo artist. Inking a deal with Capitol Records in 2003, Van Hunt released his eponymously titled debut album in 2004. The album wasn't a massive success, but it did reach the charts as the number 38 R&B/hip-hop album.Much of the fame Van Hunt has garnered in his career came following cameos on Soul Train, Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn and NPR, as these appearances led to added exposure and (consequently) an even bigger dedicated fan base for Hunt. The neo-soul singer released the hit singles ""Dust"" and ""Seconds of Pleasure"" around this time, and the 2006 album On the Jungle Floor illuminated the name Van Hunt in the music business. The album hit number one on the heatseekers chart, propelling Hunt's career into overdrive."
