If Chinese Mandarin is a tonal language, then how can people understand modern Chinese songs?
In: Other
Tone in Chinese languages is important for disambiguation, but not absolutely necessary. There is of course a non-tonal component to each word, and put enough of those together and you can figure out what the tones should have been. And don’t forget – even in English we often rely on typed-out lyrics to understand everything in a song!
Frow what I hear, though, in Cantonese often the melody is designed to work well with the tone pattern the lyrics would have when spoken. Mandarin on the other hand just ignores tone in music.
Latest Answers