Preterite

The preterite (in US English also preterit) is a grammatical tense or verb form serving to denote events that took place or were completed in the past. In general, it combines the perfective aspect (event viewed as a single whole; it is not to be confused with the similarly named perfect) with the past tense, and may thus also be termed the perfective past. In grammars of particular languages the preterite is sometimes called the past historic, or (particularly in the Greek grammatical tradition) the aorist. When the term "preterite" is used in relation to specific languages it may not correspond precisely to this definition. In English it can be used to refer to the simple past verb form, which sometimes (but not always) expresses perfective aspect. The case of German is similar: the Präteritum is the simple (non-compound) past tense, which does not always imply perfective aspect, and is anyway often replaced by the Perfekt (compound past) even in perfective past meanings.

Preterite may be denoted by the glossing abbreviation PRET or PRT. The word derives from the Latin praeteritum (the perfect passive participle of praetereō), meaning "passed by" or "past".

Spanish

Spanish may refer to:

Spain

Ontario

Other

Past tense

The past tense is a grammatical tense whose principal function is to place an action or situation in past time. In languages which have a past tense, it thus provides a grammatical means of indicating that the event being referred to took place in the past. Examples of verbs in the past tense include the English verbs sang, went and was.

In some languages, the grammatical expression of past tense is combined with the expression of other categories such as mood and aspect (see tense–aspect–mood). Thus a language may have several types of past tense form, their use depending on what aspectual or other additional information is to be encoded. French, for example, has a compound past (passé composé) for expressing completed events, an imperfect for expressing events which were ongoing or repeated in the past, as well as several other past forms.

Some languages that grammaticalise for past tense do so by inflecting the verb, while others do so periphrastically using auxiliary verbs, also known as "verbal operators" (and some do both, as in the example of French given above). Not all languages grammaticalise verbs for past tense – Mandarin Chinese, for example, mainly uses lexical means (words like "yesterday" or "last week") to indicate that something took place in the past, although use can also be made of the tense/aspect markers le and guo.

Cielito Lindo

"Cielito lindo" is a popular Mexican song from a Spanish copla, popularized in 1882 by Mexican author Quirino Mendoza y Cortés (c. 1859–1957). It is roughly translated as "Lovely Sweet One". Although the word "cielo" means sky or heaven, it is also a term of endearment comparable to sweetheart or honey. "Cielito", the diminutive, can be translated as "sweetie"; "lindo" means cute, lovely or pretty. Sometimes the song is known by words from the refrain, "Canta y no llores" or simply the "Ay, Ay, Ay, Ay" song.

Commonly played by mariachi bands, it has been recorded by many artists in the original Spanish as well as in English and other languages. Even though the song talks about the "Sierra Morena", a mountain range in the south region of Spain, in recent decades it has come to be widely known as a theme song for Mexico, based in the Spanish background of the country, particularly at international events, like the FIFA World Cup.

Lyrics

The scheme corresponds to the Spain Castilian classical stanza known as "seguidilla," i.e. seven lines of alternating heptasyllabic and pentasyllabic verses. Lyrics vary widely from performer to performer and every singer is free to add some new verse to his or her own interpretation. Some of the most traditional lyrics are the following:

Hard Candy (Madonna album)

Hard Candy is the eleventh studio album by American singer-songwriter Madonna. It was released on April 19, 2008, by Warner Bros. Records. The album was her final studio album with the record company, marking the end of a 25-year recording history. Madonna started working on the album in early 2007, and collaborated with Justin Timberlake, Timbaland, The Neptunes and Nate "Danja" Hills. The album has an overall R&B vibe, while remaining a dance-pop record at its core. The Pet Shop Boys were also asked to collaborate with Madonna on the album by Warner Bros., but the record company later changed their mind and withdrew their invitation.

Madonna became interested in collaborating with Timberlake after hearing his 2006 album FutureSex/LoveSounds. Together they developed a number of songs for the album, but the basis of the development was Pharrell Williams' demos. Madonna had a number of songs written down for the album, which amazed Timberlake. They had intensive discussions among themselves before recording a song. Later, Madonna recalled that most of the songs on Hard Candy were autobiographical in many respects. However, according to her this was not intentional and happened while she was in the process of developing the album.