BEST LOCAL SONGWRITERS

New York City had Simon and Garfunkel, so it's only fitting that Miami's most dynamic songwriting duo should have come together in a tribute to our city. Before September 11 Elsten Torres and Juan Carlos Perez Soto had been writing songs separately for years. They had even been writing songs together, off and on, for about two years prior. But when they decided to collaborate on a tune for DESCARGA, a benefit show at Café Nostalgia that marked the one-month anniversary of the terrorist attacks, the partnership took on a new urgency. Moved by a newspaper account of a woman who refused to believe her beloved, killed in the World Trade Center, would never come back, the pair penned one of the most beautiful memorials of that tragic event: "Hasta Que Regreses" ("Until You Return"). Since then the two have been writing and performing together regularly, hitting audiences with the triple threat of songs Torres created for his band Fulano, such as the slinky "Caramelo" ("Candy") and the anthemic "En Nombre De" ("In the Name Of"); Soto's more introspective "Si Te Vas" ("If You Go") and "Duenos de Este Mundo" ("Owners of This World"); and the beautiful "Hasta Que Regreses" as well as the team's lively "Dejala que Baile" ("Let Her Dance") and "Mañana." Now the Magic City has Torres and Perez.