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Ultramar is the result of the artistic communion between some of the best musicians and composers from different ambits of the contemporary music scene, and one of the most important voices of the Mediterranean and of the traditional canço in the world. The recording studio, as the hours went by, became a workshop of songs where intuition quickly became artisanship. Being the executive producer means signing up for the dream of a creator and attempting to make it possible. We were in Cuba making Ultramar, like when we were in Syria making Amic, Amat, or in Mallorca making Raixa. But accompanying Maria del Mar in this step beyond, approaching another sea, preparing in the form of an album the celebration of 50 years’ performing, free from revisions and nostalgias on the other side of the world, has been a unique experience. Difficult to repeat.

Those of us who have worked in the background have attended a recital of never-ending affections and great artistic harmonies. After so many journeys these recent years working in Cuba with so many other projects, with Ultramar I have had the pleasure of witnessing how Maria del Mar moved around and lived in Havana as if she was doing so around the streets of Palma. I remember that when we finished recording, after weeks working and living in Cuba, one day she approached me and said: – I have to tell you something Yanni. Every day I like Havana more.

Yanni Munujos

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In 1981 the second LP was reissued with the song «L’Àguila negra» added. This album would be very well received by her public.

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El 1975 apareix el seu quart senzill amb les cançons Drama, de Caetano Veloso, i Dintre teu amb autoria de Maria del Mar Bonet dedicada a Maria Bethania.

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For the exhibition about the poet Bartomeu Rosselló-Pòrcel, Imitació del foc, which opened in the Student Residence in Barcelona in May 2012, where Maria del Mar Bonet was invited to sing, the idea arose of making an album exclusively with songs of Rosselló-Pòrcel. The centenary of the poet’s birth was nearing so the record made even more sense taking into account the importance of the Mallorca poet in the career of Maria del Mar Bonet from its beginnings. Thus they compiled all the songs about poems by maintaining the original recording and adding three new ones: Quan acabarà aquell moment, Poques paraules surten and Pluja en el jardí de l’Ateneu.

The presentation of the album was in the Auditori Barrades in L’Hospitalet del Llobregat on the 7^th of October 2013. The tour of the album reached Olot, Barcelona, Navarcles, Palma, Madrid, Valencia, Camallera, Torrent, Reus and Lleida among other cities.

In May 2013 she took part in the homage to Salvador Espriu, singing songs by Rosselló-Pòrcel, a close friend of the poet from Arenys, which was in the Avinguda de la Catedral in Barcelona. In June she performed in the Concert per la Llibertat singing Què volen aquesta gent? accompanied by the Companyia Elèctrica Dharma. In July she took part in Palma in the concert in favour of the Orquestra Simfònica Balear “Ciutat de Palma” which at the time was at risk of disappearing, before more than 5,000 people. On the 2^nd of August she sang in the Culturals Nights in the Sanctuary of Gràcia, in Mallorca.

In 2014 she still did concerts of Fira encesa and began the Spanish tour with Amancio Prada of the joint show Por amar el arte. For the centenary of the birth of Joan Vinyoli they prepared La veu del mar with Dani Espasa that they took around Catalonia. She began working with the Valencia guitarist Borja Penalba.

On the 19^th of February 2015 Maria del Mar Bonet was awarded Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of the Balearic Isles.

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From that month of February 1988 in which she did the series of concerts in the Teatre Lliure in Barcelona that led to the record Ben a prop issued in 1989, Maria del Mar Bonet and Manel Camp have performed many concerts together. It was from 2007 when these joint concerts increased in number, to commemorate that album was about to complete twenty years. In 2007 they visited the Canaries, Sant Pedor and Dènia. In 2008 they went to Malaga, on the 6^th of February in the Palau de la Música Catalana, Lloseta, La Granadella in Lleida, Son Cervera in Mallorca, Tenerife, the Ateneu Barcelonés, Aranjuez. In 2009 they performed in Solsona, Marbella, and in the Festes de Gràcia in Barcelona; in 2010 Madrid and Granada among other places. Moreover, it was not until 2011 que that the album was recorded with the title Blaus de l’ànima, més de 20 anys ben a prop.

It is a double-CD which contains all the songs from the album Ben a prop and some others from earlier records such as Què volen aquesta gent?, Mercè, Mai donis per finit, Cançó de l’amor petit, Blues en sol, La Balanguera or L‘Àliga negra, and the song La barbera which had never been recorded before.

Maria del Mar Bonet explained her way of working together:  Manel has his path, with his musicians, and a tremendous amount of work as a pedagogue. I have also gone along my own path, with my group and with collaborations with people from North Africa and all the Mediterranean. But always, every year, we have performed just the two of us. Initially we had one or other musician, but later we wanted to reduce the number performing: the time comes when you like the piano and voice more. It is network-free, but that way we are freer to do what we want “. Regarding the improvisation on stage she states: Sometimes one of us follows the other. He on the piano says to me: Now I’m going to do this, let’s see what you do. We never sing the same. Never! Never, never, never! To reach this point you have to know someone as much as we know each other”.

The presentation of the album was in the Teatre Lliure in Barcelona at a press conference on the 11^th of September 2011. The tour for the album began in the Sala Clamores in Madrid and reached Barcelona from the 27^th of September to the 2^nd of October in the Teatre Lliure in Gràcia. The tour of Blaus de l’ànima around the Spanish State and Catalonia comprised more than 50 concerts throughout the year. In 2012 they did a series of double-sessions in the Sala Jamboree in Barcelona from the 2^nd to the 7^th of October.

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In July 2006 she presented the record Terra secreta in the Plaça del Rei in Barcelona. A few days before she had been awarded the Gold Medal of the City of Barcelona.

This album is a compilation of little-known songs by friends such as Joan Manuel Serrat of whom she chose Cançó d’amor petit and La rosa de l’adéu; by Guillem d’Efak she picked Blues en sol and Tant com te cerc; by Joan Bibiloni, Mai donis per finit sobre a poem by Miquel Àngel Riera and Epitalami about a poem by Father Alcover; by Ovidi Montllor, Dos anònims; Un exèrcit by Jordi Guardans; Salònica by Gabriel Sopeña; and La dansa de l’amor, by Toti Soler from a poem by King Dionis I of Portugal. She added an adaptation in Catalan of a song by the Greek singer Haris Alexiou, Per una cançó. Javier Mas and Jei Ansill put music to the poem “The Secret Land”, by Robert Graves that began and gave the title to the record, which his daughter, Lucia Graves, translated into Catalan.

In the presentation of the record Lucia Graves wrote:

In the poem “The Secret Land”, written in 1960, Robert Graves speaks to us of an imaginary and secret place to which the woman travels from this “pale external world”; a realm that she governs with her intuitive and magic powers.

When Maria del Mar sings this poem it opens the door to us to her own “secret country, her secret land, personalising the images and mythological symbols of Graves with a sensitive and powerful voice. This same voice transports us from the universal and mythological to the private, that is, to the Mallorca land from where she comes and which for half a century was the home of the British poet. Graves chose to live in a village of the Serra de Tramuntana, attracted by the presence of rugged and beautiful nature. As we all know, , Maria del Mar Bonet has also been inspired and is still inspired by her Mallorca roots, identifying with her island, opening up to the rest of the Mediterranean and the whole world through it.

With her interpretation of “The Secret Land” the Mallorca singer pays homage to a Mallorcan by adoption, to a neighbourhood. Moreover, through the poem, she invites us to discover a hidden and feminine spot, the “Secret land” within which she guards as a treasure the poems that form this compilation.

In the words of Maria del Mar Bonet “they are songs that I have had alongside me for a long time. I have enjoyed bringing them together on this album, in which there is a certain unity for the air of intimacy that they give off“.

The tour of Terra Secreta began in 2006, even though the record came out in September 2007, and would last until 2010, combining it with three shows that she had in progress in those years.

In 2007, with Terra Secreta in different places in Catalonia ( Palafrugell, Badalona, Sabadell, Prada, Igualada, Lleida), and in the Spanish State (Castelló, Oviedo, Jaen, Palma, Elche, Campello),  she toured with Manel Camp, celebrated his 40 years with the Orquestra Simfònica del Vallés in the Palau de la Música in the Festival Únicas, in what would be the embryo of the next album Bellver; she continued the Amic, amat  tour (Festival WOMAD in Càceres, Guadalajara, Lugo, Viladecans) and presented the show Els treballs i els dies with Miguel Poveda in the Festival Grec in Barcelona, the Metropolitan in New York and in Frankfurt.

2008, 2009 and 2010 could be described similarly to the previous ones: she had several shows in progress, with Manel Camp, Miguel Poveda, symphonic orchestras and Amic, Amat still. With Terra Secreta she visited many cities in the Spanish State (Gijon, Valladolid, Jerez, Zaragoza, Picassent and Canet d’en Berenguer in Valencia, Palma, Manacor, Pontevedra, Vigo, Madrid) and in Catalonia (Alella, Santa Perpetua, La Granadella, Terrassa, Auditorium of de Barcelona, Porreres, Banyoles, Cadaqués, Lleida, Sant Cugat, Granollers). On the 17^th of July 2009 she took part in the concert “Visions de la mediterrània” in the Festival Portaferrada in Sant Feliu de Guíxols along with Savina Yannatou, Gino Paoli, Franca Masu, Noa and Joan Manuel Serrat.

On the 17th  of January 2009 began with the opening ceremony of the of the Festes de Sant Sebastià in Palma by Maria del Mar Bonet who paid homage to the city of her childhood. On the 28^th of October she was given the title of Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Lleida.

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On the 26^th of May 2007 Maria del Mar Bonet celebrated her 40 years of professional career accompanied by the Orquestra Simfònica del Vallès directed by Xavier Puig in the Palau de la Música Catalana within the setting of the Festival Únicas. The arrangements were by Joan Bibiloni and Toni Cuenca who would have the task of “dressing up” these songs, in the words of Maria del Mar Bonet.

The next month, on the 16^th and 17^th of June the concert would be repeated in the Palau de la Música within the regular programme of the OSV. On the 20^th of June 2008 she would repeat the symphonic experience with the Grant Park Orchestra of Chicago, directed by Carlos Kalmar, the concert being held in the Auditorium of the Millennium Park in Chicago in the open air, before 12,000 people.

On the 24^th of July 2008 it was the turn of the Orquestra Simfònica de Balears “Ciutat de Palma”, directed by Phillipe Bender, in the Castle of Bellver in Palma. After this concert the idea emerged of making a record that as a title carried the name of the castle, Bellver, of which she had many childhood memories and from the early days as a singer.

The album was recorded with the O.S.B. “Ciutat de Palma” under the direction of Salvador Brotons in the Maller studios and in Ona Digital in Palma in January 2010. The musicians who collaborated on “the finishing touches of the arrangements” were Dani Espasa, Toni Cruz, Antonio Sánchez, Dimitri Psonis, Lautaro Rosas, Moisès Pelegrí and Cristóbal Rentero, regular collaborators of Maria del Mar Bonet. The album was presented on the 19^th of March 2010 in the Castle of Bellver, and on the 26^th of the same month a tour began around the Valencia region: Gandia, Catarroja and Valencia; on the 6^th of April in Palau de la Música Catalana with the Orquesta Simfònica Balear; on the 24^th of April in Torrent, with the Orquestra Simfònica de Torrent; the 19^th of June in Tunis, in the official concert of the closure of the Spanish presidency of the EU and on the 21^st of July she performed in Jerusalem.

In 2011 Bellver won the Internacional Cubadisco 2011 Prize in Havana, where she collected it in person and made contact with the Cuban musicians, the Jorge Reyes Sextet, in a concert they gave in the Teatro Lázaro in Havana and where Omara Portuondo was a special guest. This experience with the Cuban musicians opened up new paths for her, the results of which would be seen later.

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The origins of the album Amic, Amat, dedicated in part to the short verses of Ramon Llull adapted by Father Cinto Verdaguer can be found in two places very far apart: the village of Folgueroles where the house-museum of Jacint Verdaguer is, and Damascus, where Maria del Mar Bonet met the musicians of the Cham Ensemble of Damascus when she presented the previous album, Raixa, in the Syrian capital, in the gardens of the Azem Palace.

Amic, amat is the most mystical record by Maria del Mar Bonet. Ricard Torrents wrote in the booklet of the album: And now the symposia of the Llull-Verdaguer pearls become more complex with the voice of Maria del Mar Bonet. The singer’s action is neither an addition nor an adherence. If Llull did more than just “translate” the Song of Solomon and if Verdaguer did not confine himself to “versifying” Llull, Maria del Mar Bonet has done much more than put Verdaguer to music. Llull and Verdaguer work on the singer and the singer works on the two poets to unite all three and create a new, joint work of art, more complex and richer. A polyphonic work in musical terms, a poly-poetic work in literary terms.

Luis Delgado accompanied the singer in the musical direction of the Cham Ensemble group from Damascus, a group formed by:  Moslem Rahal, Jamal al Sakka, Maemon Rahl, Mohamad Itmeh, Mhd Muwaffar Alzahabí, Samer Aljandalil and Raafat Kassem. The other musicians taking part in the record were: Javier Mas, Feliu Gasull, Dimitri Psonis, Dani Espasa, Jordi Gaspar, Roger Blavia and Jaume Cortadellas, as well as the Coral Cantiga directed by Josep Prats. The musical arrangements were by Luis Delgado on the songs played by the Cham Ensemble of Damascus, the others by Feliu Gasull, Javier Mas or Dimitri Psonis.

The tour of the album Amic, amat was very intensive and occupied 2004, 2005 and 2006:

On the 22^nd of July 2004 she presented the album in the Teatre Grec in Barcelona in the city’s Festival Grec . In Mallorca she gave the presentation in the Monastery of the Real giving support to the “Save the Real” movement, in defence of the monastery that was threatened by the island’s speculators. In December she presented it at the SGAE headquarters in Valencia. Many places in the Spanish State and Catalonia were able to enjoy the show, which also reached the international sphere: on the 1^st of September in the Kulturzentrum Pavillon in Hannover; in November the same year in the Book Fair of Guadalajara, Mexico and she began the tour of the USA that took them to Chicago, California – Santa Cruz-, and would continue in the summer of 2005 in Los Angeles, Seattle, Boston, New York in Central Park from the 28^th to 31^st of July respectively, until doing the concert in the city of Providence on the 5^th of August, where the mayor proclaimed that from then on the “5^th of August would be Maria del Mar Bonet day” in Providence. In September 2005 she sang in Athens, in October in Damascus, once again in the Azem Palace, and in December in Alexandria.

In 2006 she returned to Damascus, Syria. A concert had also been scheduled in Aleppo which was cancelled due to military conflicts on the border that forced her to return. In March of that year she sang in the Auditorium of Barcelona and in May in the Teatro Español in Madrid. She sang in the Festival Frigiliana 3 culturas in August and in December in Berlin, in the Passion Kirche. In March 2007 she sang in the Festival de Modena, Italy, also with Amic, amat.

In February 2005 she received the City of Barcelona Prize. In July 2006 she received the Gold Medal of the City of Barcelona “for her cultural and civic contribution to the world of the song, for her desire to write about, diffuse and strengthen the common roots of Mediterranean music “.

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