Viareggio in Italy, Venice, Malta, Poland, and Spain. Paris was also well know for it carnival celebrations prior to the French Revolution.
Carnival in the New World
In the New World carnivals sprang up where European Catholics meet enslaved Africans, who themselves had long standing traditions of masking, speechmaking, singing, and dancing to mark important occasions. In these cultural crucibles carnivals took on the individual character allowed it by circumstance, events, popular demand, official dictates, and religious constraints.
In Rio, everything stops but the clock for 4 days. Every Theater, nightclub, and street corner becomes a dance hall for the confetti-bedecked subjects of King Momo. In New Orleans, Mardi Gras is famous for trinket throwing revelers, parade floats, and overt sexuality. Carnivals in Panama, Argentina, Bolivia, Columbia, Ecuador and some cities in Mexico took on their own flavors, as did carnivals in the Bahamian islands and throughout the Caribbean. Of these last, Trinidad and Tobago Carnival lead the region by inventing the steel band, which today is associated with all tropical island vacations; birthing Soca, the new sound of the Caribbean; developing costume design to new heights; and becoming a mecca for merry making with carnival celebrations that have been described as the greatest street party in the world.
Reintroducing Carnival to Europe
Today, New World style carnivals, particularly the carnival and Soca music of Trinidad and Tobago, have followed Caribbean and South American immigrants to North American cities like Boston, Miami, New York and Toronto. Trinidad and Tobago’s Caribbean style carnivals have also found