Born in Lisbon, Portugal, official documents have her date of birth as the 23rd July, but Rodrigues always said her birthday was the 1st July 1920. She was born in the rua Martim Vaz (Martim Vaz Street), freguesia of Pena, Lisbon. Her father was a trumpet player and cobbler from Fundão who returned there when Amália was just over a year old, leaving her to live in Lisbon with her maternal grandmother in a deeply Catholic environment until she was fourteen, when her parents returned to the capital and she moved back in with them.
She was known as the "Rainha do Fado" ("Queen of Fado"), and was most influential in popularising fado worldwide. She was unquestionably the most important figure in the genre’s development, by virtue of an innate interpretive talent carefully nurtured throughout a forty-year recording and stage career. Rodrigues' performances and choice of repertoire pushed fado’s boundaries and helped redefine it and reconfigure it for her and subsequent generations. In effect, Rodrigues wrote the rulebook on what fado could be and on how a female singer - or fadista - should perform it, to the extent that she remains an unsurpassable model and an unending source of repertoire for all those who came afterwards.
After a few years of amateur performances, Rodrigues’ first professional engagement in a fado venue took place in 1939, and she quickly became a regular guest star in stage revues. There she met Frederico Valério, a classically-trained composer who, recognising the potential in such a voice, wrote expansive melodies custom-designed for Rodrigues’ voice, breaking the rules of fado by adding orchestral accompaniment.
Her Portuguese popularity began to extend abroad with trips to Spain, a lengthy stay in Brazil (where, in 1945, she made her first recordings on Brazilian label Continental) and Paris (in 1949). In 1950, while performing at the Marshall Plan international benefit shows, she introduced "April in Portugal" to international audiences (under its original title "Coimbra"). In the early fifties, the patronage of the acclaimed Portuguese poet David Mourão-Ferreira marked the beginning of a new phase; Rodrigues sang many of the country's greatest poets, and some wrote lyrics specifically for her.
In 1954, Rodrigues' international career skyrocketed through her presence in Henri Verneuil’s film The Lovers of Lisbon, where she had a supporting role and performed on-screen. By the late 1950s the USA, England, and France had become her major international markets (Japan and Italy followed in the 1970s); in France especially, her popularity rivalled her Portuguese success, and she graduated to headliner at the prestigious Olympia theatre within a matter of months. Over the years, she performed nearly all over the world, going as far as the Soviet Union and Israel.
At the end of the 1950s, Rodrigues took a year off. She returned in 1962 with a richer voice, concentrating on recording and performing live at a slower pace. Her comeback album, 1962's Amália Rodrigues, was her first collaboration with French composer Alain Oulman, her main songwriter and musical producer throughout the decade. As Valério had before him, Oulman wrote melodies for her that transcended the conventions of fado. Rodrigues did not shy away from controversy: her performance in Carlos Vilardebó’s 1964 arthouse film The Enchanted Islands was better received than the film, based on a short story by Herman Melville, and her 1965 recording of poems by 16th century poet Luís de Camões generated acres of newspaper polemics. Yet her popularity remained untouched. Her 1968 single "Vou Dar de Beber à Dor" broke all sales records, and her 1970 album Com que Voz, considered by many her definitive recording, won a number of international awards.
During the 1970s, Rodrigues concentrated on live work, and embarked upon a heavy schedule of worldwide concert performances. During the frenetic period after the 25th April 1974 she was falsely accused of being a covert agent of the PIDE, causing some trauma to her public life and career. (In fact, during the Salazar years, Rodrigues had been an occasional financial supporter of some communists in need.) Her return to the recording studio in 1977 with Cantigas numa Língua Antiga was received as a triumph. The 1980s and 1990s brought her enthronement as a living legend. Her last all-new studio recording, Lágrima, was released in 1983. It was followed by a series of previously lost or unreleased recordings, and the smash success of two greatest hits collections that sold over 200,000 copies combined.
Despite a series of illnesses involving her voice, Rodrigues continued recording as late as 1990. She eventually retreated from public performance, although her career gained in stature with an official biography by historian and journalist Vítor Pavão dos Santos, and a five-hour television series documenting her fifty-year career, featuring rare archival footage (later distilled into the ninety-minute film documentary, The Art of Amália). Its director, Bruno de Almeida, has also produced Amália, Live in New York City (a concert film of her 1990 performance at New York City Hall).
Rodrigues died on the 6th October 1999 at the age of seventy-nine in her home in Lisbon. Portugal's government promptly declared a period of national mourning. Her house (in Rua de São Bento) is now a museum. She is now buried at the National Pantheon alongside other Portuguese notables.
1946.
Vou Dar de Beber ŕ Dor
Amália Rodrigues Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
À casa onde vivia a Mariquinhas
Mas está tudo tão mudado
Que não vi em nenhum lado
As tais janelas que tinham tabuinhas
Do rés-do-chão ao telhado
Não vi nada, nada, nada
E há um vidro pregado e azulado
Onde havia as tabuinhas
Entrei e onde era a sala agora está
À secretária um sujeito que é lingrinhas
Mas não vi colchas com barra
Nem viola, nem guitarra
Nem espreitadelas furtivas das vizinhas
O tempo cravou a garra
Na alma daquela casa
Onde as vezes petiscávamos sardinhas
Quando em noites de guitarra e de farra
Estava alegre a Mariquinhas
As janelas tão garridas que ficavam
Com cortinados de chita às pintinhas
Perderam de todo a graça
Porque é hoje uma vidraça
Com cercadura de lata às voltinhas
E lá pra dentro quem passa
Hoje é pra ir aos penhores
Entregar ao usurário umas coisinhas
Pois chega a esta desgraça toda a graça
Da casa da Mariquinhas
Pra terem feito da casa o que fizeram
Melhor fora que a mandassem pras alminhas
Pois ser casa de penhores
O que foi viveiro d'amores
É ideia que não cabe cá nas minhas
Recordações do calor
E das saudades o gosto
Que eu vou procurar esquecer
Numas ginginhas
Pois dar de beber à dor é o melhor
Já dizia a Mariquinhas
Pois dar de beber à dor é o melhor
Já dizia a Mariquinhas
The lyrics of Amália Rodrigues's song "Vou Dar de Beber ŕ Dor" narrate the singer's visit to the house where Mariquinhas used to live. However, everything has changed, and the singer cannot find any traces of Mariquinhas or the memories they shared in this house. The windows that used to have bright curtains and wooden planks are gone, replaced by blue glass and metallic frames. The room where they used to play music and share sardines is now a pawnshop, and the guitar, viola, and quilts with frills and tassels are nowhere to be found. The singer concludes that the only way to forget these memories is to numb the pain with some gin, echoing Mariquinhas's words that giving pain a drink is the best way to cope.
The lyrics of "Vou Dar de Beber ŕ Dor" convey a bittersweet nostalgia for a past that cannot be retrieved. The singer remembers Mariquinhas and the moments they shared, but everything has changed in the house they used to visit. The blue glass and metallic frames represent the urbanization and commercialization of the place, where sentimental values are no longer appreciated. The pawnshop that occupies the room where they used to play music and have fun suggests that everything has been commodified, even memories. However, the singer still tries to preserve these memories and cope with the pain by drinking gin. The lyrics suggest that the pain cannot be erased, but it can be eased by cherishing the past and finding ways to cope.
Line by Line Meaning
Foi no domingo passado que passei
Last Sunday is when I passed by
À casa onde vivia a Mariquinhas
To the house where Mariquinhas used to live
Mas está tudo tão mudado
But everything has changed so much
Que não vi em nenhum lado
That I didn't see anywhere
As tais janelas que tinham tabuinhas
The same windows that had wooden slats
Do rés-do-chão ao telhado
From the ground floor to the roof
Não vi nada, nada, nada
I didn't see anything, anything, anything
Que pudesse recordar-me a Mariquinhas
That could remind me of Mariquinhas
E há um vidro pregado e azulado
And there's a blue-tinted nailed glass
Onde havia as tabuinhas
Where the wooden slats used to be
Entrei e onde era a sala agora está
I went in and where the living room used to be
À secretária um sujeito que é lingrinhas
There was a thin man sitting at a desk
Mas não vi colchas com barra
But I didn't see any bedspreads with trim
Nem viola, nem guitarra
Nor a viola, nor a guitar
Nem espreitadelas furtivas das vizinhas
Nor any sneaking peeks from the neighbors
O tempo cravou a garra
Time has left its mark
Na alma daquela casa
In the soul of that house
Onde as vezes petiscávamos sardinhas
Where we used to snack on sardines sometimes
Quando em noites de guitarra e de farra
On nights of guitar and partying
Estava alegre a Mariquinhas
Mariquinhas was happy
As janelas tão garridas que ficavam
The formerly boisterous windows
Com cortinados de chita às pintinhas
With polka dot calico curtains
Perderam de todo a graça
Lost all of their charm
Porque é hoje uma vidraça
Because now they're just glass
Com cercadura de lata às voltinhas
With tin frames all around
E lá pra dentro quem passa
And inside, those that pass by
Hoje é pra ir aos penhores
Are headed towards the pawn shop
Entregar ao usurário umas coisinhas
To hand over some belongings to the usurer
Pois chega a esta desgraça toda a graça
All the fun has turned into disaster
Da casa da Mariquinhas
Of Mariquinhas' house
Pra terem feito da casa o que fizeram
To have done what they did to her house
Melhor fora que a mandassem pras alminhas
They might as well have sent it to the saints
Pois ser casa de penhores
Because being a pawn shop
O que foi viveiro d'amores
What used to be a breeding ground of love
É ideia que não cabe cá nas minhas
Is an idea that doesn't fit in my mind
Recordações do calor
Memories of warmth
E das saudades o gosto
And the taste of longing
Que eu vou procurar esquecer
That I will try to forget about
Numas ginginhas
With some cherry liqueur
Pois dar de beber à dor é o melhor
Cause giving your pain a drink is the best
Já dizia a Mariquinhas
Mariquinhas already said it
Pois dar de beber à dor é o melhor
Cause giving your pain a drink is the best
Já dizia a Mariquinhas
Mariquinhas already said it
Lyrics © OBO APRA/AMCOS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind