En Vogue

En Vogue formed in 1988 in Oakland, California. The members of the group were former Miss Black California Cindy Herron, Maxine Jones, Dawn Robinson and Terry Ellis. The group formed when producers denzil Foster and Thomas McElroy decided they wanted to make a modern-day, R&B girl group for the 1990s. They hoped to weld R&B/soul with hip-hop/new jack swing. They hosted auditions and selected the group's members. Initially, the group was named For You and later, they changed their name to Vogue. However, Vogue was similar to the name of another group so they became En Vogue.

The group performed on their producers solo album FM2 and lived together. While in Foster's car one day, the group was warming up and preparing to sing the song 'Who's Lovin' You' by the Miracles. However, Foster turned on the drum machine and the group had the idea of doing the song over the funky beats it produced. foster did one better and produced an original song in answer to the original track called 'Hold On.' The track was released as a single and made it to #2 on the pop charts and #1 on the R&B charts. It was the debut single for their first album Born to Sing, released in 1990. The album went platinum and got the girls off to a good start.

Funky Divas, the girls second album hit #1 on the US R&B charts and went triple platinum. The album had three top ten singles 'M Lovin' (You're Never Gonna Get It),' 'Giving Him Something He Can Feel' and 'Free Your Mind.'

Outside of the music world, the girls were the first black female R&B group to appear on the front cover of Vogue magazine (which seems fitting considering their name). They also made appeareances in several shows including The Wayans Brothers and In Living Color.

Robinson left the group for a solo career in 1997 while the other members recorded EV3. The album's first single in 1997 was 'Don't Let Go' which was a #2 single on the Top 100. The album's second single 'Whatever' reached #8 on the R&B charts. Driven by the success of its singles, the album eventually went platinum.

In 2000, the girls released Masterpiece Theater which failed to make a commercial impression in the US.

Starting in 2001, the group had a wide array of member changes. Amanda Cole joined the group in 2001, the same year that Maxine Jones left to take care of her newborn child. In 2003, Cole left the group and Jones returned. However, at the same time, Cindy Herron went on maternity leave after having a child. The group then gained a new member, Rhona Bennett. Some conglomeration of this group released Soul Flower in early 2004 which faired only slightly better than Masterpiece Theater on the charts.

For a brief moment in 2005, the original members of the group reunited and performed 'Whatta Man' with the group Salt N Pepa. However, Dawn Robinson could not reach agreement on business issues and decided not to stay with the group.

The current group is composed of Terry Ellis, Cindy Herron, Maxine Jones and Rhona Bennett.