Last year while scouring Youtube for language learning videos, I bumped into this guy, ConcentrationReborn, who helped alter my approach to language. He said he learned how to speak Spanish the hard way, but for his new language, Vietnamese, he learned through Karaoke. He said that after 6 months of Karaoke he had no problems reading, speaking and having conversations in Vietnamese. To verify his claims, he recorded himself singing in a Karaoke bar and read a tome of a book in Vietnamese. Although to me it might have well have been Martian.
In his video, Fluency Training, he demonstrated with a German song how he primed himself by listening and singing along with the lyrics to be ready to learn German when he was ready. He then demonstrated with a Spanish song Mitad y Mitad (Half and Half). The song was catchy and I was hooked. I don't believe he provided the title so I captured some of the lyrics and found the song on Youtube (YT). For the next two days I practiced singing that and a couple of other songs that I found on YT.
My wife, who loves, loves, loves Karaoke even tried to chime in on the songs and was surprised at my sudden interest in Karaoke when I always avoided her when she was in her Karaoke mood at the house. The guy was right! I learned a few things immediately about how certain words were combined and how certain letters are dropped. I then went to LyricTraining and found a couple of songs to practice and spent another two days immersed in mastering those songs. Over the next couple of months I periodically revisited those songs. Later that year when we celebrated Christmas and everyone came over to our house, my wife pulled out her Karaoke mic stand, fired up the projector and everybody started singing Karaoke.
Now, my family had been hearing for a few months that I had started to learn Spanish and I think they treated it just like everything else people tell them about something that's really hard. They will believe it when they see it. Well, when I was asked to sing, I casually said to my wife, "Why don't you pull up Mitad y Mitad. The music started playing and I sung like I was in a Mariachi band. Eyes widened, I heard a gasp, people started smiling and I heard someone say, "I knew you said he was learning Spanish, but he learned it for real!"
Recently, when my mother-in-law (suegra) visited, I sang it again. Only this time, I had a couple more months of intense practice behind me. She was amazed as well and also made a comment that she didn't know I could speak Spanish so well. I didn't intend for my practice of Karaoke to learn language to become a party trick, but it has. It also showed me that it seems many people don't take people seriously when they say they want to learn another language. However, more than anything else, it has become a tool in my language belt. I like variety so I will not Karaoke for six months straight, but it is in my rotation of activities to keep things fresh and interesting.
Also, after listening to Spanish songs, especially fast ones, spoken Spanish always seems slower to me. Even if the effect is temporary.
Oh yeah, if you do go listen to Mitad y Mitad, make sure to come back and thank me for introducing you to one of the coolest songs ever!!
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Bakari Akil is a Professor of Communication, blogs for Psychology Today and has authored many books on Communication and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. This is his experience learning Spanish.
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