Music

Luis Pescetti’s Gift For Family Fun Isn’t Stodgy

Written By Fernando Gonzalez
October 3, 2024 at 9:26 PM

Argentine writer, actor, musician, and singer Luis Pescetti is a one-of-a-kind artist in the Spanish-speaking world. He brings his show to the Miami Beach Bandshell on Sunday, Oct. 13 as part of FUNDarte’s annual ZunZún Children’s Festival. (Photo taken at Teatro Metropolitan, Mexico City, courtesy of  Sergio Alberto Bautista Pérez)

Finding a language, a tone, and a way of telling stories that intrigues and entertains an audience made up of children and adults is a challenge that demands creativity and a special sensibility. This has made Argentine writer, actor, musician, and singer Luis Pescetti a one-of-a-kind artist in the Spanish-speaking world.

Pescetti has published more than 30 books for adults and children, including his popular “Natacha” series, which tells the adventures of an eight-year-old girl. He is a founding member of the Latin American and Caribbean Children’s Song Movement, has released 15 albums, and in 2010 won a Latin Grammy for Best Children’s Music Album.

His repertoire, including songs such as “Merequetengue,” “El vampiro negro,” and “Queremos Comer, Comer,” use Latin American and Caribbean folk rhythms and styles but also include unexpected turns of jazz, especially old style, rap, and blues.

Peschetti comes to the Miami Beach Bandshell at 3 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 13, accompanied by a band of musicians as part of FUNDarte’s annual ZunZún Children’s Festival.

Luis Pescetti’s repertoire uses Latin American and Caribbean folk rhythms and styles but also include unexpected turns of jazz, especially old style, rap, and blues. (Photo taken at Teatro Metropolitan, Mexico City, courtesy of  Sergio Alberto Bautista Pérez)

“I was a music teacher, so of course, in the class, there was a lot of Latin American music repertoire, and something snuck in there,” Pescetti says in a phone interview from Buenos Aires. He also notes that some songs “are typical camp songs.”

Over the years, he confides, he’s been changing versions of well-known songs.

“There is one called ‘Los changos’, which is from Mexican children’s folklore, and first I did it as a children’s song, then I made it country, and now I’m doing it as a Colombian cumbia, like the rhythm of ‘Mi pollera colorá’.  My core is more bluesy.”

His shows are a mix of songs, games, and storytelling wrapped in humor and not only involve the participation of little ones in the audience, but also of the adults. In these shows, whether mothers, fathers, or whoever is the adult with the children, they are not mere companions (“the kid’s drivers,” jokes Pescetti) but very much part of the event.

“It’s very powerful for the kids to see the parents playing,” says Pescetti. “Imagine if you remembered your dad playing on stage today when you were eight, nine, ten years old. You would remember that much more strongly than if your dad had seen you playing on stage.”

Luis Pescetti’s shows are a mix of songs, games, and storytelling wrapped in humor and not only involve the participation of little ones in the audience, but also of the adults. (Photo taken at Teatro Metropolitan, Mexico City, courtesy of  Sergio Alberto Bautista Pérez)

He also notes that “almost always the messages I receive from moms are: ‘You don’t know how grateful I am to see my husband playing with my children, to see us laughing together.’ That was another surprise for me too.”

The father of two boys, Pescetti says, “It is very powerful as a dad when you see your son laugh.”

Pescetti began his career doing shows for adults, in café concerts, in 1979. “They were very small concerts, 80 people, something like that,” he recalls.  It was later, already living in Mexico, where he resided from 1989 to 2001, when he considered returning to children’s audiences. (That said, throughout his career, Pescetti has since alternated the targeting of his work between an adult and a children´s audience.)

“Doing humor for adults on television was tiring, and I began to dislike it. And then one day, I decided to change the line of work. I resorted to everything I remembered about humor for children because I had been a music teacher in schools for so many years, and I made the change.” In addition to performing during his time in Mexico, Pescetti hosted long-running children’s programs on television and radio.

He says he didn’t notice much difference between performing for an adult audience or a children’s audience, “except in the care with which you do things . . . it’s ruled out being really scary, it’s ruled out any words, any form of humor that might offend a child or a family.”

Luis Pescetti’s Miami Beach appearance is part of FUNDarte’s annual ZunZún Children’s Festival. (Photo taken at Teatro Metropolitan, Mexico City, courtesy of  Sergio Alberto Bautista Pérez)

He talks about his preparation and its simple method.

“When I think about whether a song can offend, I always put myself in the place of the dad of a little girl,” notes Pescetti. “If I, as the father of a girl, would be bothered by it, it has to be corrected.”

Having worked in radio and television and performed in theaters in Argentina, Mexico, Cuba, Spain, Colombia, Chile, Brazil, Peru, and Uruguay, Pescetti offers that children from different cultures may seem at first “that some are more obedient or more restless than others … but after ten minutes of the show, they are all very much alike.”

WHAT: Luis Pescetti in concert

WHERE: Miami Beach Bandshell, 7275 Collins Ave., Miami Beach

WHEN: 3 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 13

COST: Free but RSVP is required. (Note: Performance is in Spanish)

INFORMATION: (305) 672-5202 or (786) 348 0789. Also,  fundarte.us

ArtburstMiami.com is a nonprofit media source for the arts featuring fresh and original stories by writers dedicated to theater, dance, visual arts, film, music and more. Don’t miss a story at www.artburstmiami.com.

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