We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Raquan Roberts a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Raquan, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

I was raised by my beautiful, sweet, kind amazing mom, a phenomenal woman/mother and some of the greatest gifts she’s given me in life are Love, encouragement, faith, and time. One of the best things my mother did was show me hard work ethic and that you can be and have anything you want as long as you keep God first and work hard and to never give up no matter how hard it may seem, as a young man I remember watching my mother work hard to make sure me and my siblings had the essentials and things we liked, but the greatest impacts my mom had on me was she gave me her time/attention no matter what life brought her way she made sure I knew I was loved and I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Raquan, The Music Producer, Author & entrepreneur was never my goal as a child, I remember telling my mom & grandma that I was going to play football in the NFL and be a gangsta lol. I was one of those kids who was a natural but after my bro Ej passed I completely lost my Love for sports as he and I always told each other we were going to play for the buccaneers following that I lost my grandfather Apostle Lester Jones and due to some changes I began playing the keyboard for my church under the leadership of the late great Pastor Gwendolyn Jones and to be honest I wasn’t very good I think I played the same couple chords to every song rather fast or slow but once I got the hang of a church shout in the key of D, I ended up falling in love with Rnb, pop …etc which I started developing my sound and producing for Recording Artist Be’Ve which I was inspired by Rodney Jerkin, Be’Ve and Timbaland and learned it’s ok to be creative/different, I currently have my college degree in Sound Technology. Outside of music one of my main passion is helping young boys become young men teaching them life skills for today, tomorrow, and the future such as learning how to change brakes, how to do oil changes, and so forth, you can find out more on Facebook @youngmenwhoprogress. Last but not least if you’re into crossword puzzles or my story check out (The Assembly: The Word Search Collection and The 7/8 Year Degree: A Story Of Triumph ) on amazon by searching title or my name.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I would say I had to display Resilience in actually getting my “Sound Technology Degree” I was at the point where I was ready to give up after years of trying I remember other students coming into the program after me but finishing before me as I was failed multiple times by the same teacher causing me to lose my financial aid twice resulting in having two years off at different times, I would speak to department heads and they always sided with the teacher, I felt like I had failed and would never finish but I was able to bounce back and finish.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

The best thing society can do to support is share, buy, share but when you share give a short description because with social media so much spam comes down your timeline that people tend to ignore posts but when you add a description people are more likely to check it out because of how it’s presented,

Contact Info:

• Website: https://rbisthatyou.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/raquanbeats
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RaquanBeats
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/RaquanBeats
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkSbsi6ePdBQKa_rXkz_CmQ
• Other: https://officiallybeve.com

Image Credits
Photographer: Javonna Gist