How To Use Music To Learn A Language

Learning a language through music is something you often hear being recommended, but it’s never really explained how you can actually use it as something to learn from.

In this article I will explain the different ways you can use a song to help with your studies and actually get some benefit from listening to music.

Is Music Actually Useful When Learning A Language?

Music by itself isn’t the best way to learn a language, basically you need to actually listen to people talking normally to learn the most, but some music every now and again is helpful and it is something you should do.

Songs are short and fun, so they are an easy way to get some extra listening into your day.

However, the main problem is that the sentence structure can be a little weird, it’s more like poetry than natural speech.

This is why you need to actually listen to people speaking normally, but like I said, music can still has its place you in your studies.

(You can read more information about – Why You Should Use Songs To Help You Learn A Language)

Find Music You Like

The first step to using music to learn a language is to find songs you actually like. Music is just like any other listening material you can use. If you are not interested in it, you will not pay attention and it will be a waste of time to listen to it.

How To Find Music

If you are new to a language and its culture it can be hard to find music. You will need to go on a bit of discovery journey, but you can look on language learning forums to see if anyone is recommending what they have found, which can be super helpful at the start.

Some of these songs are going to be great for you as a learner. The language is hopefully going to be simple and clear and make for great listening practice.

If you have made any friends on language exchange apps you can always ask the natives about different kinds of music and hopefully they will have some good suggestions. Even if you don’t like what they are suggesting, it can be an interesting insight into the culture and what their country finds popular.

YouTube Is Full Of Songs, In Many Languages

The best place to start trying to find music is on YouTube as there is so much available on there.

If you are really stuck with where to begin you can simply type <“your language” songs> and you should get some results. They won’t be the best songs, but will get you started on your journey of discovery. 

Hopefully one song will lead you on to another and very soon you will be deep in the YouTube recommendations and end up with some interesting music to listen to.

Repeating Songs To Help You Learn A Language

The beauty of songs is that you can play them over and over again and they don’t become annoying. If you are doing this with normal speech it is more likely to bore you to tears very quickly.

When you are first getting started with a language you need to get used to hearing it and starting with music can be a good way to do this. You can repeat a few songs over and over again and it will allow you to get the feel of the language while also keeping you somewhat entertained at the same time.

The whole concept of listening to the same things over and over again is actually called Narrow listening. You can read more about this in this article – What Is Narrow Listening In Language Learning?

The Lyrics Can Help You Learn A Language

You can very easily find the lyrics to any song which is extremely helpful for us learners.

You can firstly read and listen at the same time, which can be extremely helpful. You will really notice how many more words you can hear once you are able to follow along by reading at the same time.  

For a beginner this is one of the best ways to help with your listening and understanding of the song.

You will very quickly pick out words you don’t know and then you can go and look them up and learn them.

When you start pairing this with the repetition I mentioned above you will very quickly find you can start to understand what is being said in the song. Having this comprehension is going to help you a lot and the more you listen, the stronger it will become.   

Listening Line by Line

I am also a fan of going through the song line by line to pick out what I can learn.

I do this both with the lyrics and the song its self and other together at the same time. I find I need to do this to really get my mind to hear exactly what is being said.  After repeating things a few time in small chunks like this I can usually hear and understand everything.

It’s a bit of a weird thing to do as you are constantly pausing and rewinding, but do this for 20 minutes and the just listen to the song all the way through normally, your general understanding and abaility to hear everything will be extremely high now.

Writing Out The Lyrics Can Help You Learn A Language (Transcription)

If you are a little more advanced, you can try and transcribe a song that you are listening to.

This is just simply writing down the words you hear and then looking up the lyrics to see if you got it right. It sounds fairly easy, but you will be surprised how tough this can be.

It is really challenging, but it will give you great practice with your listening and your writing skills.

As songs are not really that long this can be quite a nice little exercise to do as it shouldn’t take you too long, but it will really push you.

(You can read more about – How To Develop Your Listening Skills Through Transcription)

Music Can Help With Memorisation

Have you noticed that you can sing a lot of songs from memory, even if you haven’t heard them in years? I can sing so many songs from the 90s and I didn’t even try to learn them. My brain just heard these so many times back then that they are engrained in my memory for life.

Remembering songs does seem to be easier for some reason, but then maybe it’s just because the exposure levels are so high compared to anything else you listen to.  

This does mean you can do the same with the language you are learning. Part of me thinks this is pretty pointless, I don’t know why you would activity want to try and remember a song in your new language, but the option is there if you want to.

However, I have found I have listened to a handful of Japanese songs maybe a few too many times and I can now basically just start signing them from memory in the same way I can with the 90s English songs.

If there is a part of the language you want to really learn, doing it through a song could really make it stick for you.   

Karaoke Is A Great Way To Practice Your Language

If you really want to have some fun, you can try and find karaoke songs in your new language. You can then practice your reading and pronunciation as you sing along to the songs.

This can be a very amusing activity, especially if you have some friends who can also speak the language. 

It may seem like it’s just a game, but it is actually pretty good practice and can actually help with you language development. You are practicing your reading and speaking skills which is something we probably all need more of.

Passive Listening – Subconscious Repetition

Music is great as you can still listen to it passively in the background. Of course actively listening to something is always going to get you the better results, but sometimes we are bust with other things and music is the perfect way to still get some passive listening.

I think music is much easier to passively listen to than spoken voice, I think the melody of the music makes it easier for it not to be too distracting.

As I write this I have a Japanese playlist playing in the background. I am not really listening to it, my brain is very much concentring on writing in English by every now and again I may slightly tune in and hear a little bit of Japanese.  

I’ve heard these songs so many times now that occasionally I find myself singing along without even realising I’m doing it.  

Passively listening probably only gives you very minimal benefits, but I still think it’s worth it. It’s better than sitting in silence and if you are going to listen to music anyway, why not have it in your target language.   

Conclusion

As you can see there is a number of different ways you can use songs to help you study.

You just need to find a song you like in the language you are learning then try one of the methods outlines above.

You should be able to find this fun and also very helpful with your studies. The best bit is that there are so many songs you can use. You should be able to find plenty of music that you find interesting and fun