A Nossa Dança
Calema
- Language
- Portuguese
- Released
- 2023
- Genre
- Pop
- Level
- A2-
- Difficulty score
- 501
- Duration
- 3:02
How to study this song
Learning “A Nossa Dança” means 47 entries at A2- — 18 Portuguese words, 4 adjectives and 25 verb forms, every one taken from what the song actually says. Work through the glossary first: dança, amor and sorriso are the words you will lean on most. This one leans on its verbs: 25 distinct forms against 4 adjectives, so conjugation is where the effort goes. At this level the goal is recognition: hear a word, place it, keep going.
The words of this song, in several languages
Every word below is taken from this song and translated by us. Nothing here is the lyric itself — these are the individual words you need in order to follow it.
Vocabulary
| PT | EN | ES | IT | FR | NL | DE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| dança | dance | baile | danza | danse | dans | Tanz |
| amor | love | amor | amore | amour | liefde | Liebe |
| sorriso | smile | sonrisa | sorriso | sourire | glimlach | Lächeln |
This card holds 15 more words. You meet them when you play the song.
Adjectives
What this song teaches you
Level · A2-
- Vocabulary words
- 18
- Adjectives
- 4
- Word combos
- 10
- Expressions
- 6
- Verb forms
- 25
- Quiz questions
- 35
More Portuguese songs at this level
Background
About the song
Calema are two brothers, Fradique and António Mendes Ferreira, born in São Tomé and Príncipe and based in Portugal.
They have recorded together since 2011, and their music sits between pop structure, R&B harmony and the pull of kizomba, the slow partner dance that came out of Angola in the eighties. A Nossa Dança, released on 6 April 2023, is their clearest statement of that mixture.
The song opens on a wedding. Coarse salt is thrown on the floor and rice into the air — two gestures any Portuguese listener reads instantly.
Rice is the familiar one, a wish for prosperity and children; coarse salt is older and stranger, scattered to drive off bad luck. Putting them in the first two lines says what kind of song this is before a word about love arrives: a celebration that is also a protection.
What follows is a couple who almost did not happen. The singer admits he doubted, right up until their eyes met, and only afterwards could say he had found the person he was looking for. That turns the chorus from a boast into gratitude, and explains why the song asks for strength rather than assuming it.
Did you know?
The rice and salt belong to a tradition centuries older than the song. Rice at weddings is common across Europe and Asia as a fertility wish; coarse salt thrown on the ground is more specifically Iberian, used to cleanse a space of bad luck — the same instinct as throwing spilled salt over your shoulder.
Kizomba, the rhythm underneath, was born in Angola in the late seventies when musicians slowed the Antillean zouk and sang it in Portuguese.
It reached Lisbon with Angolan and Cape Verdean communities and has been part of the Portuguese soundscape since, which is why this song sounds entirely at home rather than exotic.