Mari Iijima is a Japanese singer, songwriter, and musician, born on May 18, 1963, in Tsuchiura, Ibaraki Prefecture. Her career is fundamentally tied to anime, beginning with her breakthrough role providing the singing voice for the character Lynn Minmay in the 1982 series The Super Dimension Fortress Macross. For this series, she performed several iconic insert songs, including Cinderella (シンデレラ) and the series ending theme for the final episode, Runner (ランナー). This work established her as a pioneering example of a real-world singer emerging from a fictional anime idol character.

Before her anime work, Iijima had trained in classical piano from a young age and began composing music in elementary school. She briefly attended the piano course at Kunitachi College of Music before leaving to pursue a career as a singer-songwriter. After being selected for Macross, she made her official solo debut in 1983 with the single Yumeiro no Spoon (夢色のスプーン), the theme song for the NHK anime Spoon Obasan. Her first studio album, ROSE, was released the same year and was notably produced by the legendary composer Ryuichi Sakamoto.

Iijima's musical output is extensive, with a career spanning from the 1980s to the present. Her discography includes numerous studio albums such as blanche (1984), Midori (1985), Coquettish Blue (1987), Miss Lemon (1988), and My Heart in Red (1989). She continued releasing music after moving to the United States, with albums including No Limit (1999), Right Now (2001), Silent Love (2003), Wonderful People (2004), Uncompromising Innocence (2006), Echo (2009), and Being Myself (2022).

Beyond her work on the Macross television series, Iijima is renowned for her performance of the theme song for the 1984 theatrical film The Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remember Love?. The title track, Ai Oboete Imasuka (Do You Remember Love?), became her most commercially successful single, reaching the top ten on the Japanese Oricon charts and is regarded as a classic anime song. In 1987, she performed songs for the music video OVA Macross Flashback 2012, which included Cinderella and Runner among its tracklist. She later reprised her role as the voice of Lynn Minmay for the English dub of Macross in 2006, becoming one of the few Japanese actors to voice the same character in both languages.

Throughout her career, Iijima has collaborated with a wide range of notable musicians. In addition to working with Ryuichi Sakamoto, her albums have featured contributions from members of The Alan Parsons Project, Toto, and the John Mayer Band, including David LaBruyere and Michael Chaves. She also collaborated with the late Mick Karn of the band Japan. After moving to Los Angeles in 1989, she continued to write, arrange, and produce much of her own work, eventually launching her own independent label, Marimusic. Her song Unspoken Love from the album Wonderful People won the Best Asian Song award at the Just Plain Folks Music Awards in 2006, and a track from her album Uncompromising Innocence, titled Swim, was submitted for consideration in two categories for the 50th Grammy Awards.

Musically, Mari Iijima is a singer-songwriter whose identity is rooted in pop music. Her early work, including her debut album ROSE and the city-pop influenced Midori, showcased her melodic sensibility and high, clear vocals. Her significance in the music industry is twofold. First, she is a key figure in anime music history, having helped create the template for the "virtual idol" singer that would become a staple of the industry. Second, she is a dedicated and independent recording artist who has sustained a decades-long career, bridging the Japanese and American music markets and evolving from a major-label pop star to a self-produced indie artist.