 Born Lady Viola Kinney in Sedalia, Missouri, she was one of the five children of Patrick and Lillian Kinney.Her father was a cook and her mother worked in the shops of the Missouri Pacific Railroad.Kinney studied music at Western University, a historically black college in Quindaro, Kansas, where she participated in the harmony class and the choral society under the tutorship of Robert G. Jackson, Director of the music department.