'Freestyle: A Love Story' blends romance and Latino joy in 1980s New York

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Set us as preferred Bronx-born musician and producer Judy Torres remembers the first time she heard Nayobe’s 1985 song “Please Don’t Go”: the upbeat dance track with an infectious bass line and love-struck lyrics that pleaded with a lover to stay close.“ I was floored at how beautiful of a vocalist she was,” said Torres of the Afro-Cuban artist, who hailed from Brooklyn but found a musical home in the genre known as freestyle.Though sometimes dubbed as “Latin freestyle” or “Latin hip-hop,” thanks to the many Latino vocalists who came to shape its sound, some fanatics trace the origins of the electro-funk genre to “Let the Music Play,” the 1983 smash hit by D.C.

singer Shannon.As Torres puts it, this distinctly 1980s sound — crafted with synthetic instrumentation and syncopated percussions sourced from Roland TR-808 drum machines, as popularized by Afrika Bambaataa’s 1982 single “Planet Rock” — didn’t have a label then.“It was just music,” she says.But by 1993, as prominent radio stations transitioned from dance-pop to hip-hop and R&B, the freestyle movement fizzled out.“Like a record scratch, there were no shows,” added Torres.The genre’s vibrant, knotty history of set the scene for the musical-dance production of “Freestyle: A Love Story,” of which Torres is a co-producer.

Created and directed by George Valencia — alongside his wife, “Scrubs” actor Judy Reyes as executive producer, plus “Ugly Betty” actor Ana Ortiz as co-producer — “Freestyle: A Love Story” will make its Los Angeles debut on Nov.6 at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre.

The musical tells the fictional story of two middle-aged Caribbean Latinos, who reunite during a nostalgic night at a Freestyle Extravaganza at New York’s Radio City Music Hall.As 808 kicks echo through the atmosphere, the pai...