Pio A. " Piux" Cabajar
Cebuano Renaissance Man

They simply called him Piux.

One of the most important figures in the making of Cebuano popular culture. Pio A. Cabajar (later, Piux Kabahar) was born in San Nicolas on October 11, 1892. He was the son of musician Justo Cabajar, a revolutionary who fought both in the anti-Spanish revolution and anti-American war.

Though he briefly worked as a teacher and later, secretary of the then Cebu Municipal Board. Piux was mostly a full-time artist and entertainer. A man of many gifts, he was a journalist (editor or staffer of more than 20 different prewar Cebuano periodicals), a composer of songs (which have become local classics, like Wasaywasay), and a popular director, actor, and comedian of the Cebuano stage.

He was, first and foremost, a playwright. Between 1916 and 1940, he wrote at least 35 plays, including Luha sa Inahan, Pahiyum, Fifi, and Rosas Pangdan.

He was a tireless man of the theater, performing not only in local playhouses but leading itinerant drama troupes that performed in neighbor provinces.

Though Piux lived until the ripe age of 28, the era that defined him was the prewar period, a time when Cebuano stage personalities – like Concepcion Canenea, Antonio Kiyamko, Isidora Silloria, Fernando Alfon, and others – had the popularity of movie stars today.

- Ybarra