‘Acorda Pedrinho’ song in English (Jovem Dionisio)
Learn English (& Portuguese) with translated lyrics
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Lyrics & Translations
Não sei mais pra onde ir
I don’t know where to go anymore
I don’t know where else to turn
I don’t know where else to go
Usually, we translate não mais as “anymore”. That’s with an action, like Não faço mais isso would be “I don’t do that anymore”. When mais is talking about a noun, then we normally say “else”. O que mais eu iria fazer? is “What else would I do?” In these lyrics, “else” sounds better to me than “anymore” because he’s talking about places — pra onde.
“Turn to” can mean to go to someone or something for help. So, Não sei mais pra onde ir could be translated using “turn” if the meaning is that he doesn’t know where to go for help, as if he is in distress over something.
Pronunciation tip: notice how he says pra onde like it’s one word, kind of like “pronde”. If anyone out there is learning Portuguese, it’s very common to connect vowel sounds like this, even for separate words.
Já que a noite foi…
Since the night was…
Sometimes, foi or já foi can mean that something is over or it went away. He could be saying that the night is now over, although he probably just didn’t finish his sentence. This happens a lot in music.
Acorda, Pedrinho!
Wake up, Pedrinho!
Wake up, Petey
Pedro is the Portuguese version of the English name Peter. Pete and Petey are friendly ways to say Peter, much like Pedrinho.
When he tells Petey to wake up, he breaks apart every syllable: A — COR — DA. We see this a lot in Portuguese when the speaker wants to emphasize their words.
Que hoje tem campeonato
The championship is today
The Cup is today
‘Cuz there’s a championship today
In Portuguese, it’s very common to say hoje tem (…) to describe an event that will happen today or something that will be a part of the day, like food. Hoje tem bisteca means “Today, we have (pork) chops”. But for events such as a championship, we don’t usually say “Today, we have the championship”. It’s more common to say “Today is the championship” or “The championship is today”. Since campeonato in Brazil almost always refers to a soccer championship, we can just call it a Cup.
We don’t have to translate the Que in this sentence because it makes complete sense without it. If we had to translate it, we might say “Because today there’s a championship”, since Que is giving a reason. In informal speech, you might just say “‘cuz today…”, which is short for “because”.
Also, notice how he pronounces que hoje almost like one word; “qioje”. Since the “h” in Portuguese is silent, people often connect the vowel sounds too.
Vem dançar comigo
Come dance with me
Vai ver que eu te esculacho
I’ll show you up, you’ll see
Just wait, I’ll leave you in the dust
Esculachar is one of those words that doesn’t have a direct translation to English, but it usually means something like “to embarrass” or act in a way that demoralizes someone. Words like bash, clown, slam, or show up are similar in that context. Specifically with performance, you could also say “dance circles around someone” or “leave someone in the dust”.
Vai ver is one of those cool expressions that is used the same way in both languages: “You’ll see”. Another way to express this is “just wait”, “just you wait” or “you just wait”.
Sei que não dá pra ver
I know you can’t see it
I know you can’t tell
Não dá in the sense that you can’t do something is normally translated as “there’s no way” which is the same as saying it is impossible. But with não dá pra ver, it makes more sense to say “cannot see it”.
Another way to say we can see something because it’s clear or obvious is “tell”. If the sky is blue, the sun is out, and you see people walking in short clothing, you can tell that it’s hot outside. In the same way, if you “can’t tell”, that means it is unclear or not obvious.
Mas cê vai ver que hoje não tem chocolate
But you’ll see that there’s no chocolate today
But you’ll see we won’t have chocolate today
Again, it doesn’t sound natural to say “today has no chocolate”. We prefer to say “there’s no chocolate today” or “there won’t be any chocolate today”. Since hoje não tem is talking about now and the rest of the day, sometimes in English we can express this idea as “we won’t have (…) today” in reference to the future, or the rest of the day.
I guess we should know that cê is the new way to say você, or “you”, more commonly in Brazil. It’s kind of like saying “ya” instead of “you.”
It’s also funny how he pronounces the ending of chocolate with the same “t” we would use in English. Most of the time, Brazilian “ti” or “te” sounds like our English “chee”. Sometimes, people change to a weak “t” sound just for fun since both pronunciations are understood.
Nem de segunda a sexta-feira, não adianta treinar
Neither from Monday to Friday, there’s no use in training
And not from Monday to Friday, there’s no point in exercising
The closest expression to não adianta in English is probably “there’s no use”, which both mean the same thing. Another good one is “there’s no point”. Treinar can have the meaning of both “to train” and “to exercise” when talking about physical activities. “To practice” also works, but is mostly for specific sports (practice soccer, practice tennis).
Notice how in Portuguese, you can say either segunda or segunda-feira, and it will be understood in the right context. In English however, we never say “Mon” and when we mean to say “Monday”. Sadly, English doesn’t work like that. It does work in writing though. (I’ll see you on Mon.)
Cê pode vir, mas vem agora
You can come on, but come now
You can come, but come on
“Come now” and “come on” are both imperative ways to tell someone to come somewhere quickly. Pode vir is used a lot to mean “come on” too, so both of the phrases in this line could potentially be used in the same way.
Another interesting thing in Brazilian Portuguese is that some people pronounce pode vir as pode vim, conjugating both verbs instead of just one. Since that last “r” or “m” sound is so weak, it can be hard to tell when listening casually.
Não enrola, rebola
Don’t stall, shake it
Don’t get caught up, shake it
Don’t trip, twerk it
Enrolar in the way it’s used in the song has a similar meaning to “stall”, “hesitate”, or “get caught up”. It’s like taking too long to do something and getting involved in senseless activities. If we think of enrolar as getting tangled up or being clumsy, we could also translate it as “trip” or “mess up”.
Rebolar in the way it’s commonly used in music would translate as “shake”. We say “shake it” because we’re almost always talking about shaking our butts, and so “it” lets us know we’re talking about a butt — unless we say otherwise. “Twerk” can be a good translation of rebolar too, but is a more specific kind of booty-shaking that we mostly see in hip-hop and R&B music genres. I’d add Brazilian funk to that list.
Na hora de ir embora, cê chora
When it’s time to go, you cry
When it’s time to leave, you’ll cry
Ir embora is a very Portuguese/Brazilian expression, and the most basic ways to say it in English would be “to go” or “to leave”. There are some expressions like “take off”, “go away”, “head out”, “get out”, and others that you could use, but I left it simple.
Since he’s talking about a hypothetical future (na hora de (…), você chora), you could translate chora as being in the future; “you will cry”.
Even though hora is literally “hour” in English, Portuguese speakers often use it like we would use the word “time”. Like Que hora é? or Qual é a hora? is “What time is it?”
He also kind of pronounces ir embora as one long word; “eembora”. Even though “r” is a consonant, it makes a kind of “h” sound in many Brazilian accents. Sometimes the final “r” is so weak that it isn’t pronounced at all, to the point that a word like comer is pronounced like “comeh” with a silent “h”. This can happen a lot with Portuguese verbs since they all end in an “r”.
Não sei mais pra onde ir
I don’t know where else to go
Já que a noite foi longa
Since the night was long
Because the night was so long
Ja que (…) is a very interesting way to explain yourself. The best ways to say this in English are probably “since (…)” or “because (…)”.
I added “so long” to give more emphasis to the phrase a noite foi longa. That’s because just saying “the night was long” sounds like a blunt statement. Saying it was “so long” makes it sound like more happened or that the night was really long. It adds excitement! — sort of.
Also, you can watch the full video/short film here. Thanks for reading! What did you learn from this song?
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