Jazz flautist and Latin Grammy Award winner Nestor Torres has been captivating audiences with his distinctive mix of Latin, jazz and pop sounds for more than two decades. By transforming the flute’s role in the contemporary musical landscape, this remarkable virtuoso has earned a devoted following, and has practically established a new genre of popular music.

Torres was born in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, in 1957. He took flute lessons at age 12 and began formal studies at the Escuela Libre de Música, eventually attending Puerto Rico’s Inter-American University. At 18, he moved to New York with his family, where he studied jazz and classical flute performance at the Mannes School of Music, and later at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. During this time, he developed his musical chops playing in Latin dance clubs, a scene in which he mingled with the likes of Ray Barretto, Eddie Palmieri, and Tito Puente.

He moved to Miami in 1981, and spent the next several years developing a grassroots following via his electrifying live performances in the Miami club scene. The local demand for a recording eventually led to a record deal with PolyGram and the 1989 release of his debut album, Morning Ride.

The album climbed quickly to the top of the Billboard Contemporary Jazz charts, but his career was abruptly halted by a boating accident in 1990. Despite serious injuries, along with other setbacks related to the incident, Torres refused to accept defeat. This stretch of bad fortune taught him that “no matter how difficult and hopeless my situation seemed, my life was fine,” he says. “Rather than ask why, I decided to face the obstacles head-on and overcome them.”

So Torres started over. Still in a lengthy recovery period, he recorded Dance of the Phoenix, released in 1990. Four years later, he recorded Burning Whispers, followed by Talk To Me in 1996. His Latin-jazz composition “ Luna Latina” (from Treasures of the Heart) was nominated in 2000 for a Latin Grammy. Throughout the ‘90s, he also performed and recorded with variety of jazz luminaries, including Gloria Estefan, Herbie Hancock, and Wayne Shorter.

In addition to his achievements in the studio and on the stage during the ‘90s, Torres also received two honorary doctorate degrees from Miami-based universities – one in 1994 from Barry University and the other in 2000 from Carlos Albizu University – for his commitment to youth education and cultural exchange in the greater Miami community.

In 2001, he won a Latin Grammy for This Side of Paradise. It was a bittersweet victory, given the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington at the time. “It was a great honor and privilege to win the Grammy,” Torres reflects. “But the fact that I was to receive it on 9/11 gave my work and my music a stronger sense of mission and purpose. Terrorism and violence come from ignorance, anger, arrogance and hopelessness. Music and culture inspire and empower. They soothe the human heart and enlighten the spirit. I have made it my prime point to create music and live my life as an artist and a human being in a way that does just that.”

Torres’ Heads Up International's debut, Sin Palabras (Without Words), released in March 2004, featured re-workings of the Latin classic “Contigo Apprendí,” the Alejandro Sanz hit “Regalame La Silla Donde Te Espere,” and nine original tunes. In addition to Torres’ fine musicianship, the album featured a number of talented producers, including Carlo Pennisi, James Lloyd (from Pieces of a Dream) and Jimmy Haslip (of Yellowjackets).

Moved by the tragic events of 9/11, the war in Iraq and other instances of global unrest in the new century, Torres sheds his role as entertainer with this new recording and assumes the function of artist as an agent for change. Layered with numerous shades of world and classical music, jazz, hip-hop and reggaeton, Dances, Prayers and Meditations for Peace is Torres’ musical appeal to all of humanity to rise above the petty distractions that separate us and embrace the universal elements that unite us.

“This recording is the strongest and most honest record I have ever made,” says Torres. “My entire recording career has led me to this moment. Everything I am as an artist and human being is expressed through the music in this work.”