Omara Portuondo (born in Havana, Cuba on 29 October 1930) is a Cuban singer… Read Full Bio ↴Omara Portuondo (born in Havana, Cuba on 29 October 1930) is a Cuban singer whose career has spanned over half a century.

Portuondo was born in October 1930 in Havana, one of three sisters; her mother came from a wealthy Spanish family, and had created a scandal by running off with and marrying a black professional baseball player. Omara started her career in 1945 as a dancer at Havana's Tropicana Club (following her older sister, Haydee). The two sisters used to sing for family and friends, however, and after a brief time in a band called Loquibambla Swing, in 1952 they got together with two friends (Elena Bourke and Moraima Secada) and formed the singing group Cuarteto las d'Aida, backed by pianist Aida Diestro. The group had considerable success, touring the United States, performing with Nat King Cole at the Tropicana, and recording an album for RCA Victor.

In 1959 Portuondo recorded a solo album, Magia Negra, involving both jazz and Cuban music. This didn't, however, mark the beginning of a solo career, and although Haydee left the group in 1961, Omara continued singing with Cuarteto las d'Aida until 1967.

In 1967 Portuondo embarked on a solo career, and in the same year represented Cuba at the Sopot Festival in Poland, singing Juanito Marquez' "Como un Milagro". Alongside her solo work, in the 1970s she sang with charanga band Orquestra Aragon, and toured with them.

In 1974 she recorded, with guitarist Martin Rojas, what would become one of her most critically acclaimed albums in which she sings praises to Salvador Allende and the people of Chile a year after the military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet. Among many other hits from the album, she also praises the work of Ernesto "Che" Guevara in the beautiful "Hasta Siempre".

During the 1970s and 1980s Portuonda enjoyed considerable success at home and abroad, with tours, albums (including one of her most lauded recordings in 1984 with Adalberto Alvarez), film rôles, and her own television series. Her international profile was due to soar, however, in 1996.

Portuondo sang (duetting with Compay Segundo) on the album Buena Vista Social Club in 1996. This led, not only to more touring (including playing at Carnegie Hall with the Buena Vista troupe) and her appearance in Wim Wenders' film The Buena Vista Social Club, but to two further albums for the World Circuit label: Buena Vista Social Club Presents Omara Portuondo (2000) and Flor de Amor (2004). In July 2005 she presented a symphonic concert of her most important repertoire at the Berlin Festival Classic Open Air am Gendarmenmarkt for an audience of 7,000. The entire program was specially orchestrated by Roberto Sánchez Ferrer, a colleague with whom she had worked during her early years at Havana's Tropicana Club. Scott Lawton conducted the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg.

Ausência
Omara Portuondo Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Ausencia quiere decir olvido
decir tinieblas decir jamas
las aves suelen volver al nido
pero las almas que se han querido
cuando se alejan no vuelven más...
Ausencia quiere decir olvido
decir tinieblas decir jamas
las aves suelen volver al nido

pero las almas que se han querido,
cuando se alejan no vuelven más...
no te lo dice la luz que expira
sombra es ausencia desolación
si tantos sueños fueron mentiras
por que te quejas cuando suspiras
tan ondamente mi corazón
ausencia quiere decir olvido
decir tinieblas decir jamas
las aves suelen volver al nido
pero las almas no vuelven más...
No te lo dice la luz que expira
sombra es ausencia desolación
si tantos sueños, si tantos sueños
fueron mentiras
por que te quejas cuando suspiras
tan ondamente mi corazón
ausencia quiere, quiere decir olvido
decir tinieblas decir jamas
las aves suelen volver al nido
pero las almas no no vuelven más...

Con mucho Amor para mi Madre Hermosa Niurka Romero Pantaleón... el amor de mí vida...

Overall Meaning

The lyrics of Omara Portuondo’s song “Ausencia” convey the pain and desolation of separation, best represented by the word ‘Absence’. The song highlights one of the saddest realities of life, that when we separate from our loved ones, we often never see them again. The lyrics elaborately explain that absence is synonymous with oblivion - a state of being forgotten forever. This is because the cherished memories of the past can never be relived, and the feelings that were once shared can never be felt again. The song further explains that while birds often return to their nests, the souls of lovers who once separated never do. The song’s repetitive use of “querer” (to love) emphasizes the depth of love and the hardness of the separation.

The lyrics then shift to a contemplation of the nature of absence, the way it is like a shadow or a void, a complete lack of light and presence. The second verse questions why one would complain about the absence when so many of the dreams were untrue. The lines of this verse are sung more softly, conveying a deeply introspective moment. The song concludes with the painfully poignant line “las almas no, no vuelven mas” (the souls never, never return), reinforcing the idea that the love that once existed can never be regained, and the separation is an eternal part of life.

Line by Line Meaning

Ausencia quiere decir olvido
The absence means forgotten.

decir tinieblas decir jamas
It means darkness, it means never.

las aves suelen volver al nido
Birds usually return to their nest.

pero las almas que se han querido
But the souls that have loved each other,

cuando se alejan no vuelven más...
when they leave, they never return.

no te lo dice la luz que expira
It's not told to you by the dying light.

sombra es ausencia desolación
Absence is darkness, desolation.

si tantos sueños fueron mentiras
If so many dreams were lies,

por que te quejas cuando suspiras
Why do you complain when you sigh,

tan ondamente mi corazón
my heart so deeply moved?

ausencia quiere decir olvido
Absence means forgotten.