For musician/composer Frank Leto and his lovely wife, dancer/choreographer Pilar Leto,
Carnaval has been a pivotal annual event for well over 30 years. They met, in fact, when Pilar auditioned for one of Frank’s Carnaval productions in San Francisco in 1979, and every year since then, wherever they were living—from California to Hawaii to New Mexico—they’ve
produced a Carnaval dance and music presentation.
This year, they return to the National Hispanic Cultural Center, which has hosted the popular annual extravaganza for almost 10 years, and many things in the event will be similar. Frank’s band, PANdemonium, and Pilar’s troupe, the Odara Dance Ensemble, will again feature original music and dance that celebrate the traditions of Brazil, Cuba, Trinidad, and Louisiana, and there will be a cast of about 50, astonishing costumes, stilt walkers, dazzling lighting effects, and all the rest.
But there will also be one big difference: instead of presenting a song and dance revue
interspersed with entertaining commentary, the 2014 production will premiere Carnaval: Streets of Love, an original musical created by the Letos and writer Kate Smith, who have their eyes on a final destination somewhere on or just off Broadway.