Understanding the Language: Is a Must?
 

Okay lets see what people feel. Do you need to understand what s being sung to still like the song. For example if you don't understand Japanese and without translation of the words would you still like the song?

Myself, personally yes, I believe the tone and style of the song allow you to understand what its about. To me music is just as much about sounding beautiful as its meaning behind the song. Give me a woman with a beautiful soft voice in a foreign language anyday over someone whos a lyrical genius and sings my native tongue but is a poor singer.

Go listen to Rap or Black 'club' music. Most of the time the lyrics doesn't make sense. But that doesnt stop people from listening to it. Blacks also have their 'version' of English is is quite difficult to listen to.

So No, understanding the language isn't a must... unless you are born from the 50's to 60's. Man almost all the adults around those age is stubborn to change- They hated it when foreign telenovelas invaded the primetime slots which was for most of part of the 80's and 90's have been dominated by local telenovelas. They tell me, 'you dont even understand a thing they are saying and yet you are still watching this?' Then I just say 'meh' who cares. Same goes for foreign music.

I won't take personal insult but you must have a bad batch of "people born from the 50s to the 60s" :) I know quite a few people my age who regularly listen to music from around the world without necessarily knowing the language (or at least knowing it well).

Personally, I listen to music from all over the planet. Understanding the general gist of a song is nice but it does boil down to the musical rhythms and the vocal qualities of singers. Our music library includes american rock, japanese traditional and pop, Tibetan throat-singing, Swedish folk tunes, gaelic music, medieval music (chant and folk), american bluegrass, iranian ballads, african drumming and a variety of musical styles, particular american country singers, classical, metal rock, ambient, techno, space electronica, ....

@tritoch... you might want to rework that post a bit. It comes off a bit insulting to african-americans (I take it that's what you meant by "black", remember this is a global internet, not just an american one) ... I'm white but having been raised in urban parts of Texas -- rap/urban lyrics usually make sense and I have no problem with the slang dialect. You might say "Some blacks..." or "some types of rap".

And of course, your second paragraph insults people my age :) I find people of *any* age who can be quite narrow in their listening tastes and resistant to concepts they're not familiar with.

I agree with Vexx. It is more important for the music to sound nice (to me). I don't really need to "understand" what is about. In addition, I very much prefer to listen to songs I don't understand while I'm working, because I would otherwise be very easily distracted by the lyrics! :heh:

(Besides, isn't music supposed to be the "universal" language? ;) )

I guess that's why I generally listen to instrumental music while working. I'm experimenting with classical music at the moment (thanks to Nodame Cantabile; funny what anime can inspire you to do :p), and I find it works too. I'd listen to just about any kind of music that doesn't come from the pop industry (far too formulaic and bland for my tastes), but I'm very far from being as eclectic as Vexx. :heh: It'll be easier for me to pinpoint what I dislike, rather than what I like actually. For example, I don't like hip-hop or rap. I can't explain why. I only know I don't like either genre in general.

I don't really care for most lyrics, there are only very few that I'd actually consider good. But since lyrics only play a minor role for me when listening to music that's not all that bad. And a whole lot of awesome songs got no lyrics at all.

So no, understanding the language is by no means a must; as long as it's good music I'll listen to any genre in any language.

I have a particular liking for the sounding of Japanese, since I love the language, and thus I feel more inclined to like something that sounds like Japanese, even when there are times when I have no idea what they're talking about :heh:. Nevertheless, I have no problem with listening to things I don't understand, unless it's something like rap where lyrics play a huge role... then again, I don't have a particular liking for rap anyways.

I don't think understanding the language is important in enjoying music... it adds to the enjoyment of a song you already liked if you know the meaning, but if the music sucks I doubt you'll care about the lyrics anyway. How many people can really understand most of the English pop or hip-hop songs anyway?

As for me, I enjoy East Asian pop by default but I also enjoy Russian and Thai pop music, and I can't understand a single word of either one. Some people might not like it, but I've always thought the Russian language sounds funky when sung. :)

A song is nice even you don't understand the language because you like the melody. Sometimes words don't count.

i listen to japanese songs all the time and dont understand a word. but you dont need to understand to get how the artist feels.

I don't think you need to understand what's being said to enjoy the music, but if you did understand the lyrics it can enhance your enjoyment that much more because you can analyze them. However, this can also be a double edged sword. You might really like a song because of the rhythm and melody but once you understand the lyrics and realize they're crap, it might just ruin the song for you.

Its interesting that everyone feels the same, I thought there would be disagreement. But I'm glad everyone thinks it doesn't matter ^_^

SO..most people say no(include me)
is not matter~music is quite a personal like and dislike,as long as it in the headphone ,i don't think any can go against it.W.

but to like a foreigh music,is better to hold some understaning of it,the words of song do matter~i like japanese music best,insturment ,than english,the last is my prime chinese cantonese and chinese M
,i can at least understand 1/3 anyway,is also quite fun to tranlate word and phrase to your own Language,just sme extra fun to listen to music.W.

I find this to be one of the most frequently asked, and annoying question's regarding music:

Take a look at a lyrics sheet. You see words, right? Where's the music? Sure, you can obviously enjoy reading the lyrics and such as much as listening to the music - but regardless of whether or not you understood someone when they're performing the actually music it doesn't matter. Lyrics in no way effect harmony, melody etc. while performing them. They're more of a way for people to work their way around notes, and have fun doing so.

With that said, it's also not entirely true that understanding the lyrics isn't important... Important isn't quite the word... But either way. If you're classicaly trained in music, and have lived listening to and examining multiple pieces of music for a large portion of your life you really stop caring about the lyrics (unless, of course, you're a lyricist or songwriter).

The short version... Basically, not unerstanding lyrics isn't bad at all: listen to an MIDI file for example. No lyrics. But the music is still there in it's entirety, albeit digitally rendered (and often flawed). So listening to a song in a language you don't understand is basically like listening to an MIDI file... But with more emotion available (sometimes, note that most artists lack even that these days).

Uh, what? I have very little difficulty understanding what my black Physics teacher or my theory instructor tells me. Might want to tone down the racial stereotyping in the future....unless you meant something else...

I think language does matter to some extent...understanding the meaning of something will always skew your perception of it. Being a bit distant from the actual language though, oddly, actually helps me appreciate lyrics more. The same often happens to non-english friends of mine who listen to english tunes - they feel the lyrics are much more complex than I do, probably because I use the language every day. Whereas I find it really interesting to listen to foreign music and then connect the words with their meaning. Maybe what I'm saying is, words and syllables seem more artistic when they are not in a language I use every day and am so familiar with,.

Well usually I find out what the song means by looking up the lyrics' translation, but I rarely memorize the translation line by line. It's just good enough for me to understand the gist of the song.

That is a very good observation. I noticed that as well - more with German than with English obviously, but the same thing. When you're not being confronted with a language every day you perceive lyrics written in that language in fact as more complex / better.

Wow no way!


I enjoy it whether I understand it or not, perhaps more when I don't.

Nah. It's about the feeling inherent in the song.

I like a lot of non-english music, even though I don't understand it half the time. It's all good!

I don't think its necessary. I mean, i listen to the CD's of anime music all the time and i don't understand them. Most specifically, the Luckt Star opening theme. Even if that was in English i wouldn't be able to understand it, they sing so quick! As long as the music is good, it doesn't even need lyrics!

Although lyrics are important.

The thing is... most of the japenese music I listen to (well actually all) is sound tracks to my favourate anime. Most of these have no lyrics anyway, and alot the lyrics arn't exactly great lititure.

I mean look at the numa numa song? The lyrics for that stank, but people didn't understand them so loved it anyway.