A Vida Toda
Carolina Deslandes
- Language
- Portuguese
- Released
- 2017
- Genre
- ballad
- Level
- A1+
- Difficulty score
- 479
- Duration
- 4:06
How to study this song
Learning “A Vida Toda” means 83 entries at A1+ — 25 Portuguese words, 17 adjectives and 41 verb forms, every one taken from what the song actually says. The glossary is the place to begin — filho, dia and sol are the song’s keywords. This one leans on its verbs: 41 distinct forms against 17 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| filho | son, child | hijo | figlio | fils | zoon | Sohn, Kind |
| dia | day | día | giorno | jour | dag | Tag |
| sol | sun | sol | sole | soleil | zon | Sonne |
| olhar | gaze, look | mirada | sguardo | regard |
What this song teaches you
Level · A1+
- Vocabulary words
- 25
- Adjectives
- 17
- Word combos
- 12
- Expressions
- 12
- Verb forms
- 41
- Quiz questions
- 35
More Portuguese songs at this level
Background
About the song
«A Vida Toda» is the song that turned Carolina Deslandes from a talent-show finalist into one of the best-known voices in Portugal. Born in Lisbon on 27 August 1991, she first came to national attention in 2010, at nineteen, when she finished third in the fourth season of «Ídolos», the Portuguese version of the Idol format on SIC. She released a self-titled debut album in 2012 and «Blossom» in 2016, but by the spring of 2017 her career was far from secure.
She released «A Vida Toda» on 13 April 2017, sharing it first on YouTube. Years later she recalled that on the day it came out she did not have a single concert booked, and that the song changed her life for ever. It was written for Santiago, the first son she had with the producer Diogo Clemente, born in June 2016; when the single appeared she was expecting their second child, Benjamim, who was born that June. The couple had a third son, Guilherme, at the end of 2018.
The song is a letter to the future. A mother imagines the day her son is old enough to ask how he came into the world, and she rehearses what she will tell him: how she met his father on a bright day, how a late-summer dinner became something more, and how she came home one day with news that made her partner cry with joy. The last verse jumps decades ahead, to a grown-up son with a family of his own and two parents grown old together. Between the verses, a short chorus insists that everyone knew from the start this was love meant to last a lifetime.
Musically it is a gentle pop ballad built on piano and voice, and its lyrics are written in the Portuguese of Portugal rather than of Brazil. That shows in the informal «tu» forms, in the way pronouns are attached to the end of verbs with a hyphen, and in very Portuguese expressions for noticing something instantly or for eyes filling with tears.
The single was later included on «Casa», her third studio album, released by Universal Music Portugal on 20 April 2018, which went to number one in Portugal. The same album produced «Avião de Papel», a duet with Rui Veloso, and «Adeus, Amor Adeus».