Rita Lee Jones de Carvalho was born in São Paulo, Brazil, on December 31, 1… Read Full Bio ↴Rita Lee Jones de Carvalho was born in São Paulo, Brazil, on December 31, 1947, and passed away in her hometown on May 8, 2023. Best known as Rita Lee, was a Brazilian MPB singer, composer, multi-instrumentalist, actress, writer, TV host and animals rights activist of American and Italian descent, being regarded as the "Queen of Brazilian Rock".

Rita helped to incorporate the rock revolution into the creative explosion of tropicalismo, formed the most celebrated Brazilian rock band in the world, Os Mutantes, and created solo songs with enormous popular appeal without losing her freedom and irreverence.

Former member of the group Os Mutantes (1966 — 1972) and leader of the band Tutti Frutti (1973 — 1978), Lee participated in important revolutions in the world of music and society, such as the Tropicália movement during the Brazilian dictatorship, which led her to be the artist with the most censored songs in Brazil during that period. Her songs, usually watered with an acid irony or with a claim for female independence and sexual topics, became ubiquitous in the charts. The album, Fruto Proibido (1975), released together with the band Tutti Frutti, is commonly seen as a fundamental milestone in the history of Brazilian rock, considered by some as her masterpiece.

In 1976, Lee began a romantic relationship with guitarist Roberto de Carvalho and since then he has been the partner on most of her songs and accompanied her in all her live performances. They had three children, including Beto Lee, also a guitarist, who accompanies his parents in concerts. With a career that has reached 50 years, Rita Lee has gone from the musical innovation of the late 1960s and 1970s to the highly successful romantic ballads of the 1980s. In October 2008, Rolling Stone magazine promoted the List of the 100 Greatest Artists in Brazilian Music, where Rita Lee ranks 15th.

In 2001, Rita Lee won the Latin Grammy for Best Portuguese Language Rock Album with "3001". She would receive five more nominations for the award and in 2022, she was awarded the Musical Excellence award for her body of work. In 2012, she announced that she would retire from performing live due to physical frailty. "I retire from shows, but never from music," she wrote on Twitter.

She was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2021 and had been undergoing treatment for the disease. She passed away in her hometown of São Paulo at the age of 75 on May 8, 2023.

O Amor em Pedaços
Rita Lee Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Vivemos sob o mesmo teto
Um amor pode durar um século
Tudo foi um grande engano
Nosso amor só durou um ano
Vamos nos ver outra vez?
E o amor se acabou em um mês

O tempo voa

Quando se ama e nem notei a semana passar
A vida começou
No dia em que a gente se encontrou
E o tempo parou

Falei o que não devia
Nosso amor durou só um dia
Ele riu, mas agora chora
Seu amor se acabou nessa hora

O tempo voa
Quando se ama e nem notei a semana passar
A vida começou
No dia em que a gente se encontrou
E o tempo parou

Pra onde vai tudo o que se sente
Eu só voltei pro amor durar pra sempre

Você fala, e eu não mais te escuto
Nosso amor não passou de um minuto
Ele deu um suspiro profundo
E o amor parou por um segundo

O tempo voa
Quando se ama e nem notei a semana passar
A vida começou

No dia em que a gente se encontrou
E o tempo parou

Overall Meaning

The lyrics of the song "O Amor Em Pedaços" by Rita Lee evoke the emotions and thoughts of a love that was intense, but fleeting. The first stanza talks about how they lived under the same roof and how the love could have lasted for a century, but everything was a mistake, and their love only lasted a year. Despite this, the singer still yearns to see their lover, but their love was over in just a month. The second stanza acknowledges the pass of time, how it flies when you're in love, and how it felt like everything began the day they met, and time stood still.

In the third stanza, the singer admits to speaking out of turn, causing their love to last only a day. They reflect on how their lover laughed then but now cries since their love ended right then and there. The fourth stanza mentions the fleeting nature of feeling and how the singer wants to go back to make their love last forever. The final stanza describes how there was a loss of communication and how their love lasted only for a minute, ending in a deep sigh.

Line by Line Meaning

Vivemos sob o mesmo teto
We lived together under the same roof

Um amor pode durar um século
Love can last for a century

Tudo foi um grande engano
Everything was a big mistake

Nosso amor só durou um ano
Our love only lasted a year

Vamos nos ver outra vez?
Shall we meet again?

E o amor se acabou em um mês
And the love ended in a month

O tempo voa
Time flies

Quando se ama e nem notei a semana passar
When you love, you don't even notice the week passing by

A vida começou
Life began

No dia em que a gente se encontrou
On the day we met

E o tempo parou
And time stopped