Ney de Souza Pereira (born August 1, 1941, in Bela Vista, Mato Grosso do Su… Read Full Bio ↴Ney de Souza Pereira (born August 1, 1941, in Bela Vista, Mato Grosso do Sul), widely known as Ney Matogrosso, is a Brazilian singer.

An uncommon artist with an uncommon sopranino voice, Ney Matogrosso fell in the Brazilian popular music scene like a bomb in the '70s aboard the Secos & Molhados. The end of the group marked the beginning of a fertile and successful solo career in which he began exploring his sensuous and charismatic persona through satiric and ironic repertories. As time passed, he substituted self-contained and deeply sensitive interpretations of classics for the popular and classical Brazilian music. Along with his representative and prolific solo discography, for which he received three platinum and three gold records, Matogrosso recorded in Itália with Astor Piazzola, performed in Argentina, Uruguay, participated in two Montreux Jazz Festivals (Switzerland), and toured Portugal several times. He also performed in Israel and the U.S., but always refused invitations to develop an international career. Matogrosso also worked as an actor in Sonho de Valsa (by Ana Carolina, the director, not the singer/composer) and Caramujo Flor (short subject by Joel Pizzini), and directed shows by RPM, Cazuza, and Simone.

Arriving in Rio de Janeiro in 1966, Matogrosso became a hippie leather artisan and divided his time between Rio, São Paulo, and Brasília, where he was a close friend of singer/composer Luli. Through her he met João Ricardo, who had a vision for a groundbreaking group and was searching for a high-pitched male voice. Invited by Ricardo, Matogrosso moved to São Paulo where he spent one year dedicating himself to exhaustive rehearsals, artisanship, and theater plays. With the explosive success of Secos e Molhados and the group's final dissolution, Matogrosso started his solo career exploring his unusual voice timbre, his mesmerizing scenic persona, and his androgynous visuals, enhanced by innovative and exotic costumes. A second solo album, Água do Céu - Pássaro, was supported by the show Homem de Neanderthal, in 1975, with which Matogrosso opened in Rio de Janeiro, drawing both raves and packed houses. "Barco Negro" and "Homem com H" appeared amongst considerable polemics aroused by the usual conservatives on duty. In that period, he worked with Astor Piazzola in Milan, Italy, where he recorded a double single with the Argentinean composer. A cleaner Matogrosso recorded Bandido in 1976, having his first national hit as a solo artist with "Bandido Corazón," written especially for him by Rita Lee.

Olhos De Farol
Ney Matogrosso Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Por que só vens de madrugada
E nunca estás por onde eu vou?
Somente em sonhos vi a luz da lua cheia
O canto da sereia
No breu da noite eu sei que reinas a me refletir

Olhos de farol
Porque tu és a lua e eu sou o sol

Porque só brilhas quando eu durmo
Sou condenado a te perder
Eu só queria ver andar na ventania
Luar do meio-dia
Na minha fantasia, ainda sou teu pierrô

E disfarço mal
A lágrima de amor no carnaval

Eu te vi em sonhos
A boiar no meu jardim
Lua de cetim entre os lençóis
E no céu sem nuvens
Podem as miragens
Se tornar reais e são dois sóis

Eu te vi rainha
Dona de nós
Imitar a voz dos rouxinóis
E no céu em chamas
Podem as miragens
Se tornar reais e são dois sóis

Porque só brilhas quando eu durmo
Sou condenado a te perder
Eu só queria ver andar na ventania
Luar do meio-dia
Na minha fantasia, ainda sou teu pierrô

E disfarço mal
A lágrima de amor no carnaval

Eu te vi em sonhos
A boiar no meu jardim
Lua de cetim entre os lençóis
E no céu sem nuvens

Podem as miragens
Se tornar reais e são dois sóis

Overall Meaning

The opening verse of Ney Matogrosso's song "Olhos De Farol" is perplexing at first, as it poses a simple but compelling question: "Why do you only come at dawn, and why are you never where I go?" The lyrics immediately create a sense of longing for someone who is absent but still present in the singer's mind. This person seems to come alive in the full moon's light and the sound of a siren's call. The singer is acutely aware that this presence is not tangible, but rather a reflection of their own emotions.

The chorus brings in the metaphor of lighthouse eyes, which are always shining but only visible to the singer when they are asleep. The singer feels condemned to lose this person, and they can only imagine them dancing in the wind like a noon-time moon, a figure from a bygone era whose spirit still haunts them. The second verse has an even stronger sense of idealization, as the singer sees this person floating in their garden and wrapped in a satin moon. As the song progresses, the music builds into a crescendo, and the repeated chorus drives home the idea that the singer can only cling to the hope of seeing this person again in their dreams.

Overall, "Olhos De Farol" speaks to the idea of yearning for something that is almost out of reach, that only exists within the mind of the singer. The repeated presence of moon and light imagery suggests that this person is both illuminating and elusive, a paradox that the singer can never fully reconcile.

Line by Line Meaning

Por que só vens de madrugada
Why do you only come at dawn

E nunca estás por onde eu vou?
And why aren't you ever where I am?

Somente em sonhos vi a luz da lua cheia
I've only seen the full moon's light in my dreams

O canto da sereia
The siren's song

No breu da noite eu sei que reinas a me refletir
In the darkness of the night, I know you reign, reflecting on me

Olhos de farol
Lighthouse eyes

Porque tu és a lua e eu sou o sol
Because you are the moon and I am the sun

Porque só brilhas quando eu durmo
Because you only shine when I sleep

Sou condenado a te perder
I am condemned to lose you

Eu só queria ver andar na ventania
I just wanted to see you walking in the wind

Luar do meio-dia
Moonlight at noon