Born in the Bronx to a Puerto Rican mother and Dominican father, Anthony Santos, who goes by Romeo on stage, first started singing in the choir at his family’s Catholic church. Though he initially joined the choir to meet girls, he quickly discovered he had a gift for singing. In 1994, he and his cousin Henry Santos formed the band Los Tinellers with brothers Lenny and Max Santos (no relation to Anthony and Henry), which in 1996 became Aventura. The band blended bachata a bluesy guitar-driven style of dance music born in the Dominican countryside with R&B, hip hop and rock, the sounds they heard playing on street corners in the Bronx.