On the southernmost point on the island of Ibiza lies Las Salinas Beach, where one man has been performing a soundtrack to the good life for over a quarter of a century.

Twice a week, every week, Jon Sa Trinxa makes the journey from his home to Las Salinas. He takes his usual two glasses of fresh juice at Las Salinas Restaurant, then settles into his little beach hut, and begins to make and mix music. When the sun goes down about eight hours later, so does the music, and Jon Sa Trinxa makes his walk home. 

In Born Balearic Jon tells his own story; he was born Jonathan Grey in a small English town. Though he was always obsessed with music, the pressures of the “real world” and urgings from his mother to “get some proper work” led Jon through a series of more practical (and less satisfying) jobs in Britain. Then all at once on a rainy day in London twenty five years ago, the stock-market crashed and Jon’s apartment was burgled. On that day, Jon began both his music career and his life as a Balearic. But Jon’s journey to Las Salinas still had twists and turns to come, including being hit by a car while hitchhiking and being rescued by the owner of Las Salinas Beach on the side of the road.  Ever since, Jon has performed on that same beach, mixing a unique and personal genre of music that is both deeply familiar and totally new.

Jon’s music is Balearic: an undefinable, fluid, kaleidoscopic blend that defies genres, but more importantly reflects the values of the island’s permanent residents. It meshes across nations and cultures and eras, and it pulses with life and happiness, and it’s unlike anything you can find there or elsewhere. 

But Born Balearic isn’t just about Jon’s performances on the beach. It’s a stunning, abstract audiovisual exploration of the community that has heard its own voice in his music: an international collection of creatives and craftspeople and thinkers that includes a leather artisan from Paris, a Kurdish new-age musician from Iran, a former New Yorker who publishes a newspaper that reports only optimistic news, and various other members of Ibiza’s cultural scene. All of these people have made their lives on this island, and they all share an ecosystem with Jon. They all represent Balearic culture, and Jon’s transcendent music is this culture’s soundtrack.