NETEASE IS YOUR BEST CHOICE TO LEARN ENGLISH VIA SONGS
They say that lots of English songs in these days could be easily located in NETEASE, but they haven't told you that you can get your English improved via listening them in certain ways. What to do to find the right songs matching with your taste and level and make the most of them, this is exactly what the article is about.
THE CLUES TO FIND SONGS NEW TO YOU
If you don't know what to hear, start from the following 5 aspects and find your cup of tea.
PRIVATE FM
You come across different songs every time you turn on private FM. The system will bring you different songs and all you need to do is clicking like or next.
HITS
You will have all the heat songs recommended by NETEASE each day here. Click each song open and you will find most of them worth listening.
MIX
This works as a bulletin board for popular music lists. Each list is with similar songs for a certain topic, and the hottest lists available may be shown on the home page of this APP.
CHARTS
You will have a better sight of the ranking of English songs in different platforms. Come here and you will see what's new in the western music circle.
TALENT SHOW VIDEOS POSTED BY RELATED ACCOUNTS
You can also follow some of the amazing accounts pushing videos of talent shows. And the performance of candidates do light up your passion to a certain song.
One more tips for you, you can do the extension by finding other songs of the same singer and get them favored. Then your list will be expanded with more choices.
For example, you find a list with a song named HANDS, then you could go a further step to check the artist and then the other songs from her.
THE APPROACH TO MAKE THE SONG YOURS
You don't have to learn every song hit your ear, but those arousing the emotional resonance deep inside. Just keep finding songs new and keep your brain soaked and ears drenched in the river of music. Then you will find in surprise that what used to sound strange and difficult to identify become friendly listening to you. You only need to be familiar with the how English is pronounced and spoken to make it easy for you.
Start from the country music, lyric songs easy to follow and then something challenging like songs with rap, rock and electronic music with frequent beats per minute.
Pick your song and go along with the following steps.
LISTEN TO IT WITHOUT LYRICS
Feel what kind of emotion it brings to you with your eyes closed. You may find that your hearing is sharpened with eyes shut, and catch whatever phrase, word or even syllable that hits your ear. English coming to you via music and song is spoken in a more exaggerated way than daily spoken English in conversation, since the song requires emotion and rhythm, so most of the words are pronounced in a more emotional way and some of them got prolonged and extended, making it more clear for us to see how they are spelt syllable by syllable. Mind the rhythm and you may have a better understanding of how the English just sounds like a river flowing along as a song when you speak. I am talking about the sense of fluency when you speak, and your spoken English is always judged by how fluent you speak instead of how less accent you have or how advanced the vocabulary you apply. Language is all about being spoken fluently from the perspective of phonics. It is easier for others to forgive your accent to an acceptable degree and your wording simple and limited, but they may say that your English is not good enough if you get stuttered and is not able to say what you mean in a fluent way. Keep listening to be familiar with the sense of flowing and make sure that you can make your voice flow with less barrier when you speak English.
REVIEW IT AGAIN WITH LYRICS
You may loop the song for 10+ times and then move on to the lyrics with the melody and rhythm engraved within your mind. Lyrics may reveal what you have missed just now hearing without text. And the details and certain word you failed to identify become clear to you, and that's how lyrics work here at the moment. It is not a good idea to read the lyrics when you hear a song for the first time since it may limit your imagination and all potential feelings you may have to this song. What's more, it is not good for practicing your listening skills in English. You may have this kind of feeling when you do the listening test. What sounds difficult and unclear to you is easy the way beyond your expectation when you have the text. So do not let the lyrics lower the challenge to yourself.
SHADOW EACH LINE UNTIL YOU GET THE PRONUNCIATION AND EMOTION SAME AS THE SINGER
Imitate the singer to sing the whole song, one line at a time. Not to move to the next line until you can get a 80% copy of the original singer in pitch and rhythm, production and emotion.
READ THE LYRICS BASED ON THE RHYTHM AND SPEED OF THE MUSIC
You read the lyrics in the rhythm of the music, and that's a pretty good way to familiarize yourself with the lyrics. You can have more attention and energy for the improvement and beautification of the tone, emotion of the voice, and focus more on the power and penetration of the voice.
SING ALONG WITH THE MUSIC AND GET IT RECORDED
You may take recording of the your voice of singing so as to identify the gap between your voice and that of the singer. You know how you sound exactly and have more clear direction to perfect your voice and the way you sing in English.
TAKE A VIDEO OF HOW YOU SING THE SONG FROM BEGINNING TO THE END
You must make yourself feel good when you do a certain thing in order to do it well. Take a video while singing then you know how far away left to be reached if you want yourself to look confident and professional. Mind the mouth and tongue when you sing and you will have a better idea of whether you get the pronunciation in the right way.
THINGS TO GET BESIDE A SONG
VOCABULARY APPLICABLE FLEXIBLY
Look up the word new to you or has some other unfamiliar meaning, see the explanation of it in English, and you know how it is applied in certain situation. Then find the opportunity to use it in your daily conversation or article.
ENGLISH EXPRESSION IN A NATIVE WAY
There are some of the phrases giving exact vivid wording of how you feel, describing situation in an accurate way, and you will come across a lot of them in English song.
ATTRACTIVE AND FAIR SOUNDING PRONUNCIATION
Singer has a beautiful voice based on perfect pronunciation and that's what you could try to beautify while singing.
CONFIDENT AND PERFECT FEELING WHEN YOU SPEAK ENGLISH
You need a control of your voice and emotion when you want to sing well. And such a sense of control makes you feel good about yourself, which may bring positive influence to your performance. And this performance makes further fantastic effect to the status when you speak English.
Do the above to each song you are interested in and witness how you get improved in English step by step.