Ney Matogrosso says he was the cupid of Rita Lee and Roberto de Carvalho

One of the closest friends of Rita Lee and Roberto de Carvalho, Ney Matogrosso made a revelation this Tuesday (9). He was the couple’s cupid, as he introduced the musician to the rocker almost 50 years ago. “I was doing a show in São Paulo, and Rita went to watch it. I saw that she paid a lot of attention to the guitarist (laughs). Then, she invited me to dinner at her house and said to me: ‘You can bring any musicians you want ‘. I took him, because I knew it was Roberto that she wanted to see”, said Ney.

Roberto de Carvalho was part of Ney Matogrosso’s band and agreed to go to that dinner. There, he also fell in love with Rita. “Their meeting was instantaneous, they instantly sat down at the piano and started to compose.

Ney mourned the singer’s death, this Monday (8), at the age of 75, and recalled the day he saw his friend for the first time, still at the time of Mutantes in the 1960s. “The first image I have of her it’s her dressed as a bride, with a pregnant belly. I saw it and thought: ‘What a transgressive girl’. We’re talking about the 60s, where a bride could never be pregnant. And from then on, I never stopped paying attention to her.” .

He was also keen to praise Rita Lee’s intelligence. “She had a privileged intelligence. Rita wrote things that people needed to hear”, concluded Ney.

Rita Lee and Roberto de Carvalho had been married for 47 years and had been married for 26 years. The two met before the singer started a solo career and were the parents of Beto, Antônio and João. The singer had been battling lung cancer since 2021.