BETWEEN BEFORE AND AFTER: MEMORY, GRIEF, AND THE CONTINUITY OF LIFE IN A BALADA DE TIM BERNARDES

Abstract

A Balada de Tim Bernardes, released on the album Mil Coisas Invisíveis in 2022, links the memory of a grandmother to reflections on time, maturation, self-care, and the continuity of life. This essay aims to discuss the relationships among memory, grief, maturation, and the continuity of life in the song, articulating its interpretation with an autobiographical experience of listening. It is a theoretical-interpretive essay developed through a full reading of the lyrics and repeated listenings to the song, from which three interpretive axes were organized: the memory of the grandmother and the continuity of the bond; time, maturation, and transformation; and singing, self-care, and the continuity of life. The discussion draws on the perspective of continuing bonds, the understanding of grief as an interpretive and communicative activity, and studies on the role of music in everyday experience. The analysis suggests that the memory of the grandmother does not oppose the transformation of the person who goes on living, but takes part in it. Singing, in turn, does not appear after conflicts have been resolved, but within the tensions among memory, desire, restlessness, and change. The essay concludes that the song offers a way of reflecting, within the field of mental health, on cultural forms of narrating loss and on the possibility of continuing to live without erasing bonds with those who have died.