After exploring the traditional repertoire from a contemporary perspective in their early works, Tarta Relena delved into tragic thought, oracles, and humanity's relationship with the uncertainty of the future to write and perform És pregunta (2024), an album produced entirely by the duo formed by Helena Ros and Marta Torrella. With the maxim 'less is more' as their banner, Tarta Relena offers a set of songs that narrate impermanence and turn their live performance into a ritual. Voices are the main instrument, and the different languages they sing in bring different "worldviews" to the album. They will present it on July 31st in the garden of Casa Llorenç Villalonga in Binissalem as part of the La Lluna en Vers festival. We spoke with one of them, Marta Torrella.

They knew each other by sight until an event caused their life threads to become entangled forever. Linguist and professor Nicolau Dols tells us about the writer Biel Mesquida: “In 2001, Biel published T’estim a tu, a collection of articles about Mallorca at the time. I wrote a review of it in El Mirall. A few days later, when we were still using answering machines, I arrived at the office and there was a message from him. He didn’t say anything to me. He simply recited, impeccably, Joan Alcover’s poem Desolació. I understood that gesture as an elegant and very typical way of thanking me for the review. It must be said that he has one of the best voices in the Catalan Countries for reciting.” The friendship was consolidated a little later, when they coincided working at the UIB. Nicolau did not know Biel as a child, but their relationship is such a long after-dinner conversation that the professor says he can give some details about it.

“When you bit me, God left saliva / inside the wound and the coolness of his great lip. / And the saliva flooded my blood. / And a voice full of nests was born in me”. The set of verses is from the poem ‘Soledat oberta’ (Open Solitude), included in the book Entre el coral i l’espiga (Between the Coral and the Ear of Corn) published in 1952. The author is Blai Bonet, of whom this year marks the centenary of his birth – and a voice, indeed full of nests, which still spreads everywhere. The last verse of this stanza gives its name to what will be the central spectacle of the Blai Bonet Year, a production by the Fundació Mallorca Literària that aims to vindicate the relevance of one of the most unique voices in Catalan literature and invite the public to rediscover it through a journey along the paths of his great themes.

As a baby he slept a lot, so much so that his grandfather would often say to him: “You need to get a move on, be sharp. It’s not good to sleep so much”. He was so content in his baby role that he had little interest in walking. One fine day, without having gone through the crawling stage, he got up, put on his shoes – on the wrong feet – and started walking. “I think his steps just came to him because he’s very stubborn!”. This is told to us by Aunt Marieta – Maria Bauzà – the wife of the brother of Miquel Àngel Raió’s mother, who started dating the old man when the current director of the Principal Theatre of Inca was only two months old – she was 17 years old. She saw him born. And she still remembers the laughter that the family produced seeing him walk in that way, so confident, the day the child decided it was time to get up.

As a child, she was creative, bright, and very independent. She is the third of four siblings who were born and raised in Palma, behind the Born: “She had a very rich inner world. She spent many hours playing in the courtyard that is now Casal Solleric, imagining stories and building her own universes”. She is slightly scattered, but with a lot of “visionary capacity”. In fact, 25 years ago she decided to make a change in the family restaurant, create her own vegetable garden there and bet on local, zero-kilometer produce: “It seemed like an extravagance at the time, but when she had an idea in her head, she would go ahead with it without paying much attention to what others said”. This is how she launched Ca na Toneta, the iconic family restaurant in Caimari. Maria Solivellas (1970) is the chef who revolutionized it, but before putting on an apron, she did many other things, driven by an infinite curiosity. This is told to us by the actress Catalina Solivellas, her second sister – the eldest is Teresa, and the youngest, Pep.

The world we inhabit and what we can do to improve it, respect and rootedness for language and culture, honesty and sensitivity when writing, composing and singing, poetry and close references like Ovidi Montllor, and collective dignity and freedom are the main axes on which the musical project of Andreu Valor (Cocentaina, 1978) lives and grows. He is one of the best-known singer-songwriters on the recent Valencian scene, even though he says his is a "minority proposal." He has released 12 albums since 2007; the latest, Els camins que elegim, which he will present in Mallorca on Friday, July 3, as part of the La Lluna en Vers festival program. He will be accompanied by his travel companions, musicians and producers of recent years, Blai A. Vañó́ and Héctor Tirado.

It is known that he was a friend of the writers Blai Bonet, Bernat Vidal i Tomàs and Jaume Pomar; also of the couple formed by Maria Antònia Oliver and Jaume Fuster – the latter, incidentally, taught him the first notions of computing. He was born in 1945 in Santanyí, a land of writers. And the protagonist of these lines is no exception: Antoni Vidal Ferrando, poet, narrator and historian. His story is told by the writer's eldest daughter, Antònia. He has another son, Andreu.

It was at the beginning of the year, on January 24th, when Ferran Palau released the album Aniversari feliç. An album of ten songs with a visual part full of fog and a protagonist: the ghost. The musician explains that the fog represents the “idea of being in heaven, in the clouds,” and the ghost is a metaphor for shedding layers: clothes, skin, until only the soul or spirit remains. “I needed to give up certain clichés that were associated with me and my music,” he says. Thus, he has removed the drums, proposing a listening experience that takes the listener to a no-place, an ethereal, light space. He will present Aniversari feliç in Mallorca on June 27th, in the garden of Casa Llorenç Villalonga, as part of the La Lluna en Vers festival. We spoke with him.

He has an extraordinary natural talent for rhythm and a very fine sense of harmony. In fact, he even played bass with people from the Deià scene, linked to English punk, in groups like Sex Beatles. Who knows if it's because from a very young age he listened to music that didn't sound anywhere else on Mallorca: his older brother, Jaume, brought him the latest music records directly from London in the early 70s. The middle brother is Joan and the protagonist of these lines is the gallerist Xavier Fiol (Palma, 1962). He is brought to us by who would be, given the years they have known each other and the affection they have, the fourth brother: Ivan Albons.

“I’m interested in concerts having a more scenic space, that music becomes a much broader spectacle”. Maria Arnal thus summarizes the philosophy of the live performances she proposes with AMA, her first solo work after closing the stage in 2022 with Marcel Bagés. The artist could also be describing the spirit of the new edition of La Lluna en Vers, the festival of the Fundació Mallorca Literària, which this year also bets on hybridization, research and different ways of understanding the relationship between music and words. This Saturday, June 20, she will present the album AMA in Mallorca. It will be a concert in Consolació, Sant Joan, and will inaugurate this summer's La Lluna en Vers festival. 

When he was young, between 8 and 10 years old, he greatly enjoyed the horror book series Goosebumps, by R. L. Stine. As an adolescent, he listened on repeat to the album Californication, by Red Hot Chili Peppers. During the 2003 Copa del Rei final, which Mallorca won, cameras captured a boy running towards the players, dressed in white, with a microphone in his hand, trying to get the first statements amidst all the joy: “That boy was my brother,” says Manel Barjacoba, the younger brother of IB3 Radio director, Daniel Barjacoba (born in Binissalem), who is called Dani. Before all that, however, Sílvia arrived, the older sister, with whom Dani is practically one year apart: she is from 1985 and he is from 1986. Indeed: this year is Dani's 40th year. And Manel, the youngest of the three, who is seven years younger than the journalist, tells us about it.

From a very young age, she had her ideas very clear. “When she set her mind on something, she had to have her way,” they say about her. She soon developed a special ability to achieve what she wanted: “She knew perfectly how to ask for things from each person. She did it with innocence, but she almost always succeeded. She had great intuition for reading people.” Children and stories have been two constants throughout her life. When she was a girl, she would sit the little ones down and tell them stories. Later she studied teaching and worked for a few years as a Primary school teacher before dedicating herself fully to philology. We are talking about Caterina Valriu (Inca, 1960), na Catalina Contacontes, and her older sister, Paula, who is seven years her junior, introduces us to her.

He heard the first jotes and boleros in Valldemossa, where his father was from, a village that was beginning, in the mid-50s, to be touristy. She was born in 1948 and grew up in Palma, where her mother was from. At her home there was a pickup that was always on. The first records she listened to were Picolíssima Serenata, by Renato Carosone, and Una Casita en Canadá. She was particularly marked by French chanson and Italian singer-songwriters, but she also developed a taste for classical music: “She deeply adores Bach”. She is the second of three siblings: the eldest is Biel, a lawyer; the youngest, Rafel, a set designer. She is a composer, one of the most recognized voices in Mallorca: we are talking about Miquela Lladó. Pere Estelrich, a mathematician, musicologist, and collaborator of various media, introduces us to her.

A close person, with a smile that enchanted and shining eyes, eager for knowledge, for love, and for life. Very soon he began to play the guitar and to take an interest in music and songs. For him, there was no other path than music: “His father was already a musician, and his mother was called Cecilia, the patron saint of music.” Neus Ferrer says this, half-seriously and half-jokingly, highlighting the kindness of the character we are about to discover today: “When it got dark, he always accompanied me home. Over time, I discovered it was because he was very interested in my neighbor, Mercè, whom he eventually married.” Neus Ferrer’s lifelong friend is the musician and linguist from Ibiza, Isidor Marí (1949).

The teacher, who was a smoker, left the students in her 4th grade class alone for a moment because she had to go down to speak with the administration. On the table, she left a video camera, which she had used on the study trip they had returned from just a few hours earlier. Upon re-entering the classroom, she found the students recording each other, imitating the teachers. “They imitated me smoking with one hand in the back pocket of their pants.” There was one student who led all the mischief, an adorable leader who was liked wherever he went. Today, he is a recognized novelist and poet. It doesn't surprise her that he has reached where he has. We are talking about Carles Rabassa (Palma, 1977) with his former teacher, Bàrbara Terrassa.

Once upon a time there was an island of deserted beaches and crystal-clear waters; with mountains to hike and find absolutely no one. It's hard to imagine, but once, in the Palma bullring, there were only low buildings and vacant lots, and adventurous 12 and 13-year-old pre-teens who went camping alone on the other side of Mallorca. Nowadays, in fact, camping on the island is strictly forbidden. But those days existed, and that island, when kids wanted to dance and dress like Elvis Presley, and The Beatles had all their dreams to fulfill. Today's protagonist "wanted to be the Mallorcan Peter Fonda", was "a very good racetrack rider (motorsport discipline) and had a childhood "tied to the street and nature". He is Xavier Pastor (Palma, 1950), one of the great references of environmentalism in the Balearic Islands, and a childhood friend and lifelong friend, Santiago Bonnín, tells us about him.

He did his military service with little enthusiasm. He studied Systems Informatics at the UIB. At 15 years old, he became so passionate about volleyball that, when he was already living in Palma, he would return to Manacor once a week to train. At only fourteen months old, he already spoke clearly. He wasn't one of those children who get tangled up with their words: he quickly developed the ability to express himself with precision. Joana Gomila, mother of the mayor of Manacor, Miquel Oliver Gomila, tells us this. It's hard to get words out of Joana. At the end of the conversation, she reveals why: “A mother always speaks well of her children. What else are we going to say? And I… I don't just want to praise him.” There will be some, but not that many.

Born in 1979 in Palma. He has roots in Felanitx (on his mother's side) and Santa Margalida (on his father's side). He has lived in Madrid for years, but, in the eyes of others, he has the power of omnipresence, because he can give the impression that he is everywhere. His favorite place in the world is Portocolom. He is the middle of three siblings and if one thing characterizes him it is that he has "inexhaustible energy". It is strange that someone doesn't know who he is, because every now and then he enters everyone's dining rooms, and it's not that he does it silently: we are talking about the television presenter David Ordinas (I know more than you, The best party…), who is also a singer, composer and actor. Xisco Pericàs introduces him to us, and they have known each other since they were four years old.

It's made of Umberto Tozzi. But let's go back: she was born in a house of onions, so she had to be an onion, yes or yes. From a very young age she showed interest in drawing and today it is her way of "unfolding". She played with Nancys, but she often exchanged them for her little brother Pau's Airgam Boys, with whom there is a four-year age difference. It is he who brings us closer to the figure of his older sister, politician Xisca Mora Veny (1971). She recently left the mayor's office of Porreres, her hometown, after 13 years.

He was a futsal goalkeeper until he started to be afraid of the balls. He also did swimming. He liked (and maybe still does) playing Pro Evolution Soccer with friends. He has a younger brother, with whom they grew up in the Escorxador neighborhood. He is a "polyhedral and difficult to explain" character. Perhaps it is his elusive and distant character at first rather than anything else, but even his lifelong friend, Àngel Mendoza, finds it difficult to define the character of Lluís Cabot (Palma, 1990), musician and producer. He is known, above all, for having been the leaderof Da Souza for a decade. Àngel Mendoza, who will introduce us to the character, was the band's drummer.