Broken guitar | When the breeze whips

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by Mário de Andrade (1893 - 1945)

Translation © by Sarah Daughtrey, Lucy Zollner

Viola quebrada

Language: Portuguese (Português)

Our translations: ENG

Quando da brisa no açoite 
a frô da noite se curvô
Fui s'incontrá com a Maroca meu amô
Eu tive n'arma um choque duro 
quando ao muro
Já no escuro meu oiá andô 
buscando a cara dela e num achô.

Minha viola gemeu, meu coração estremeceu
Minha viola quebrou, teu coração me deixou.   Ah!

Minha Maroca arresorveu 
por gosto seu me abandoná
Porque os fadista nunca sabe trabaiá
Isso é bestêra que das frô 
que bria e chêra a noite intêra 
Vem apois as fruita que dá gosto saboreá.

Pur causa dela eu sou rapaiz muito capaiz de trabaiá
E os dia intero, e noite intêra a capiná
Eu sei carpi purquê minh'arma está arada
Arroteada capinada c'oas foiçada
dessa luis do teu oiá...

Text Authorship:

by Mário de Andrade (1893 - 1945) [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887 - 1959), "Viola quebrada", subtitle: "Toada caipira", W 158 no. 6 (1919-29), published 1929 [ voice and piano ], from Canções típicas brasileiras, no. 6, Paris: Max Eschig [sung text checked 1 time]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (Sarah Daughtrey) (Lucy Zollner) , "Broken guitar", copyright © 2017, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this page: Mirna Rubim

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 20
Word count: 124

Broken guitar

Language: English after the Portuguese (Português)

When the breeze whips 
The night flower curves itself
I went to find my love Maroca 
I felt a hard blow in my soul
when to the wall
Already in the dark my eyes went searching
For her face and couldn’t find it.

My guitar moaned, my heart shuddered
My guitar broke, your heart has left me. Ah!

My Maroca decided, 
as is her pleasure, to leave me 
Because the singer never knows how to work 
It’s foolish to think that the flower 
That shines and smells all night long
Will then grow into fruit that gives pleasure to taste.

Because of it I'm a guy very capable of working 
And every day, every night I weed 
I mourn because I know my soul is ploughed
Ploughed and cleared as if scythed by 
The light from your eyes...

Text Authorship:

Translation from Portuguese (Português) to English copyright © 2017 by Sarah Daughtrey and Lucy Zollner, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

a text in Portuguese (Português) by Mário de Andrade (1893 - 1945)
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2017-05-05
Line count: 20
Word count: 138