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Written in fRoots issue 228, 2002


MARIA DEL MAR BONET
Raixa
WorldMuxxic 8431588018422 (2001)

Since recording her first single in 1967 Mallorcan singer María Del Mar Bonet has made over twenty albums, not counting compilations, and filled concert halls at home in Catalunya and abroad; her first live album was recorded in 1975 at Paris Olympia. This, her third live album, was recorded at a series of five nights celebrating 25 years of her shows in one of her favourite venues, the Plaça del Rei in Barcelona, during the 2001 GREC 2001 festival. It’s dedicated to the garden of Raixa, a leafy place of water, stone steps dating back to Mallorca’s Islamic era.
      Some songs derive from Mallorcan or Menorcan tradition; the rest are settings by herself and others of texts by writers from Mallorca, Catalunya, or in one case a translation from the Gallego of Rosalía de Castro. All are in Catalan, but you don’t need to understand that to be stirred by them.
      She was making pan-Mediterranean connections decades ago, including working with Greek musicians and Tunisian ensembles. Here she’s accompanied by Javier Mas on 12-string guitar, archlute and bandurria, Feliu Gasull on Spanish guitar and Dimitri Psonis on bouzouki and percussion, with the strings, flutes, accordion and voice of the ten-member Ars Ensemble, directed by Joan Valent.
      The latter is not only writer of several of the songs, including the storming De Sentir, but is also the main creator of the arrangements, which range from the wonderfully lush, such as a bandoneon-like accordeon or flamenco guitar beautifully interleaved with winding string lines, to the vocal percussion of Mas, Gasull and Psonis with Del Mar Bonet soaring above them.
She sings with thrilling fire and passion and impeccable artistry, but there’s not a hint of admire-me diva bullshit; she delivers every lyric from the heart, not over the head, in a voice which even when touching full power never loses its communicative warmth.
      For the closing number, cued by the audience bursting into a jota-rhythm encore clap, she takes up the cuatro to lead Jota Marinera, then her voice recedes as she leaves the stage singing solo.
      Overwhelmingly magnificent – a twelve-encore kind of show, beautifully recorded, by a great singer at her peak.


© 2002 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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