Meet Robert John Arroyo. People call him RJ. Although RJ took nursing back in college and finished, he wasn’t able to take the board exams and ended up working as a call center agent right after graduating.
RJ shares that he has loved music since he was a kid. In fact, he started playing piano when he was 6 years old and was always fascinated by different music instruments. He discovered his love for the ukulele back in college. After his piano suffered the aftermath of Typhoon Ondoy, he borrowed his friend’s old Lyric Ukulele that was hanging on a wall in their house. “After playing a few chords on it, I immediately fell in love with the sweet and soothing sound of the uke,” RJ shares. He dubs it a ‘happy instrument’ because all of his stress vanished then and there.
It therefore isn’t any wonder that RJ has been playing the uke consistently since then. He admits that he didn’t take it seriously at first and was just playing casually, but when he saw other players on YouTube, he tried playing the same stuff.
“When I got my gig in Singapore as a Ukulele Advisor (sales) and instructor, that’s when I really learned because we didn’t do anything else but practice everyday,” RJ shares. “In my 4 years there, I learned a lot from fellow players. I learned more about the uke and different genres. I was also lucky enough to study under James Hill, a famous canadian uke player/teacher when he went to Thailand.”
RJ was also offered a sponsorship by KoAloha Ukulele Hawaii during his second year in Singapore and is currently a KoAloha Supported Artist. Here in the Philippines, RJ is a full-time ukulele instructor and artist at Uke Box Caffe.
(RELATED: Uke Box Caffe: Sing, Eat, Chill, Bond and Even Learn to Play the Ukulele)
