"All the Man That I Need" is a song written by Dean Pitchford and Michael Gore. The song was first recorded as "All the Man I Need" by Linda Clifford for her album I'll Keep on Loving You (1982). In 1990, American singer Whitney Houston had a number-one multiple chart hit with this song, recorded as "All the Man That I Need", from her third album, I'm Your Baby Tonight (1990). Houston's version was released as the album's second single on December 4, 1990 by Arista Records. Her version featured production from Narada Michael Walden and the single became a major worldwide hit, received mainly positive reviews from music critics, and reached number one on the US Billboard Hot 100; it remains her fourth biggest-hit in that chart. Background "All the Man That I Need" was originally written in 1981, by Dean Pitchford and Michael Gore. They had Linda Clifford in mind when they wrote the song, having written the song "Red Light" from Fame for her in 1980. Clifford recorded her version of the song, "All the Man I Need," for her 1982 album I'll Keep on Loving You. She released it as a single, but it failed to chart. Pitchford later stated that although different versions of the song were recorded, no one was scoring a major hit with it: "I figured that it was one of those songs that was going to get cut a number of times and not ever have its day," he said. During a dinner with Arista Records' president Clive Davis, the song came up and Davis asked Pitchford to send him a demo. Davis had just finished working with Whitney Houston as the executive producer of her second album, Whitney (1987). Although he was impressed by the song, he felt they would be unable to do anything with it at that time as Houston had only just finished recording an album, so it would be some time before she would be returning to the studio. During this period, Pitchford's publishers received several requests from other artists wishing to record the song. Houston eventually recorded it for the album I'm Your Baby Tonight (1990). Composition "All the Man That I Need" is an R&B song. According to the sheet music published at Musicnotes.com by Alfred Music Publishing, the song is written in the key of F minor with a key change to the