Do the tones end up being a big deciding factor in the melody of the song? For example, how much different would Twinkle Twinkle Little Star sound in Chinese vs English because of the different use of tone?
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It kind of depends. A lot of times you can still sing, and the meaning is implied from context of the other lyrics. Other times the song melody is written with the tonality of the language in mind so it “works”.
This has already been asked here a ton of times though:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/search/?q=tonal+language+singing](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/search/?q=tonal+language+singing)
Have a look for some excellent and more in-depth answers from native speakers of a tonal language, which I am not.
Don’t know about other dialect, but singing in Mandarin is done in 1st tone (level) for all words.
The tones are NOT a part of the melody. The way its sang is different from its spoken tone.
howver, you’re right that the intonation can change the meaning of the words.
Individual words might have their meanings switched, but based on the context of the lyrics, title of the song, we can quite automatically assume its meaning.
In the example of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
一闪一闪亮晶晶 (Yī shǎn yī shǎn liàngjīngjīng) the correct one
衣山衣山量斤斤 (Yīshān yī shān liàng jīnjīn) a mix of similar sounding words.
The first one is the correct lyrics, 2nd one is a jumbled up verse about
A Mountain of clothes, weight a pound . Just hearing it, i would assume its the first correct verse.
In chinese songs, there’s really no intonation. They follow the melody’s tone. However, even without intonation, you can usually use context clues to piece together the meaning of the lyrics. It’s also why chinese music videos often come with subtitles on them already.
One thing to note is that the tones are more subtle than some people think. It usually doesn’t change the pitch enough to affect the melody. Think about how in English, people ask questions by having a raising inflection during the sentence. You can still have things that are clearly questions in songs. It’s a similar idea.
Or how words in English have emphasis on certain syllables, but it doesn’t necessarily interfere with song writing.
Also, there’s context clues and other aspects to the tones beyond just pitch. The 4th town, which is the downward one, is a bit staccato and shortened. So it behaves almost like an emphasized syllable.
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