I am not 100% sure if I can give my opinion here though, I’ve been always thinking it would be really great, if LingQ have some music contents with the same way they have the other contents now.
In a beginner course especially, it’s really easy to remember the vocabulary and such if there are some simple songs that people can sing along easily. In this case, there are a lot of traditional songs out there.
And in a more advanced level, some of the great pop music would be just perfect in learning.
I actually listen to a lot of traditional French song in my learning, and it helps a lot. But I feel something is missing, and that is what the LingQ have now in their system. It’s just always a great help to see what kind of usage or the words I am not familiar with, yet.
I think learning language with music is greatly efficient because it’s a lot more fun.
I am about to upgrade my account because I can’t add my LingQ anymore. But I am quite worried thinking what if I don’t use this site in the future as much as I thought I would be using it. I am worried because I think I get easily bored in LingQ. LingQ have a great system though, I am sure LingQ would be much more fun place if there are some music contents.
Well you can just pay for a monthly basic account for 10$ a month and then just downgrade to the free membership if You’re not using it anymore.
As far as music, lingq cannot offer any music that is under a copyright. Especially alll the popular music out there.
If you want to learn with Music on Lingq , Just IMPORT it yourself but don’t publicly share it. Keep it for yourself. . Buy the MP3/ Convert you CDS into MP3 of all the music you like and cut and paste the lyrics from an online source.
If you want to know how to import your own content. Please read the Help:
By importing the music yourself you get exactly what you’re looking for…
As keroro mentions, the main problem is the copyright. We would certainly welcome members to write and record their own songs to put on the site, even if it’s a simple “Head and shoulders, knees and toes” type of song.
But you are always welcome to import songs privately and study them that way. Paying members are allowed to import an unlimited amount of private lessons, so you could potentially fill your imports will all of your favorite songs as well
About copyright: when does the copyright of song lyrics expire?
I would like to share the lyrics of some traditional Italian songs dating back to the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century. I would read them myself and add a link to a Youtube video. Can I do so?
In Germany, the copyright of song lyrics expires 70 years after the death of the composer/songwriter (unless the inheritors enforce their claims to prolongate the copyright, but I’ve never heard of such a case concerning song lyrics).
As much as I know, the traditional music of the 19th century - or earlier - is in the public domain, so it shoudn’t raise any problems.
The publication of an interpretation is another business. In this case, the interpreter has a copyright on his/her interpretation (no matter how old the music is).
But if you only link to youtube and don’t upload the content to another website, this shouldn’t be a problem, too.
Learning languages from music…that’s Susanna Zaraysky’s thing, isn’t it?
(I once tried to improve my Afrikaans by listening to Bok van Blerk songs, but I had to quit because I found it was making me really aggressive! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc0H0lw4B78 )
