Mandarin pop/rock lyrics in Pinyin

Lately I’ve been adding the lyrics to some songs, including titles by Cui Jian, Faye Wong, Wu Bai and China Blue, and Jay Chou.

I haven’t included Chinese characters. Keep in mind that songs are meant to be heard, not read. Also, tones generally disappear when words are sung. Thus, these songs should be considerably easier to understand when read in Pinyin transcriptions than when listened to alone. (It’s the same with other languages, too, of course.) If you find you’re having trouble, liànxí, liànxí.

34 thoughts on “Mandarin pop/rock lyrics in Pinyin

  1. I have read that songs in other Chinese fangyan such as Cantonese have a tradition in songwriting which tries to better preserve the tones, and remains so in contemporary Cantopop. Perhaps this little “footnote” should be mentioned, just so people know the “tone loss” phenomenon is specific to Mandarin songs?

  2. I have read and been told that other Chinese fanyan such as Cantonese have a tradition in songwriting that usually tries to preserve the tones when singing, and that this persists to this day in contemporary Cantopop. Perhaps this little “footnote” should be added so that readers know that this “tone loss” phenomenon is specific to Mandarin songs?

  3. Say is there anyone who can translate the lyric to Wong Faye’s Eyes On Me (CHINESE Version). I haven’t been able to find it on-line anywhere. The english version is easily accessible, not the chinese version, however. My chinese is unforntuately limited. Perhaps some kind fella can guide me on this. I appreciate any and all assistance. This is a great site by the way! It’s an easy read and comprehensible.

  4. Great! I love Wu Bai’s music. His lyrics are all written in traditional Chinese, which I can’t read. This helps alot. Now I can do Karaoke!

  5. hi,.. can i ask u ,.. how to get a pinyin lyric,.. i wanna do the karaoke but i can;t read the chinese… only can read pin yin,.. i wanna xin ru dao ge by jacky cheung,. thanks

  6. Here’s a quickie version I didn’t check for accuracy.

    wǒ de tiān shì huīsè
    wǒ de xīn shì lánsè
    chùmō zhe nǐ de xīn
    jìngshì tòumíng de
    nǐ de yōuránzìdé
    wǒ què shùshǒuwúcè
    wǒ de xīntòng jìngshì
    nǐ de kuàilè
    qíshí wǒ bù xiǎng duì nǐ liànliànbùshě
    dàn shénme ràng wǒ zhǎnzhuǎnfǎncè
    bùjué wǒ shuōzhe shuōzhe tiān jiù liàng le
    wǒ de zuǐjiǎo cháng dào yīzhèn kǔsè
    wǒ shì zhēn de wèi nǐ kū le
    nǐ shì zhēn de suí tā zǒu le
    jiù zài zhè yī kè quánshìjiè shāngxīn juésè
    yòu duō le wǒ yī ge
    wǒ shì zhēn de wèi nǐ ài le
    wǒ shì zhēn de gēn tā zǒu le
    néng gěi de wǒ quándōu gěi le
    chúle ràng nǐ zhīdao
    wǒ xīnrúdāogē

    For other pinyin lyrics, you might try running the characters through Adsotrans.

  7. can anyone tell me if there is a version of the song ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ in Chinese? I would like to get hold of a copy and I am sure I heard it once!

  8. Hey guys, I just downloaded this song entitled Eyes On Me (Chinese version) by Faye Wong. I know of the same-titled song in English, the one in FF8, but I’m not sure if this is really the Chinese version of that song since the melodies are totally different. Perhaps this song was just falsely titled? Can anyone listen to the song (I downloaded it on Limewire) and tell me its true title, or if it really is the chinese version? I really love it, but can’t seem to find its lyrics anywhere on the net!!!

  9. To Jo and plt:

    There is a “Chinese Version” of Faye Wong’s “Eyes On Me” on Limewire. The melodies of this Chinese Version and the English Version are different because the Chinese Version is not “Eyes On Me” at all. It’s actually “Hong Dou” (Red Bean), the B Side of Faye Wong’s “Eyes On Me” single. “Hong Dou” was not used in Final Fantasy VIII at all, and the English Version of “Eyes On Me” was used in every language version of the game, even the Japanese Version.

    “Hong Dou” was sang in Mandarin, and its lyrics are at this website:

    http://www.leoslyrics.com/listlyrics.php?hid=iIDpoPmmPjU%3D

    …Translated into English and transliterated into pinyin. Hope this helps someone else who is searching the Internet for this information as I was. :)

  10. I would like to request lyrics for Fish Leung songs in Pinyin and the English translation, especially “Bu Xiang Shui”. can somebody help me with this? Please reply to my email (bubble_tppg@REMOVETHISyahoo.com). Thank you.

  11. I’D LIKE TO FIND OUT THE SONG LYRIC FROM NICHOLAS(sONRIA PASTA),COZ I DON’T REMEMBER THE TITLE, I ONLY REMEMBER THE LYRIC WHIGH HAS WORDS LIKE THIS “….WU GUI MEI…WO AI NI…”PLEASE HELP ME….SHE-SHE NI..

  12. may i request for lyrics for songs by Fahrenheit (fei lun hai)? songs like xia xue and i would also like to request for lyrics for songs by Tank eg. zuan shu tian shi… thanks…

  13. ****************************
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    PLEASE READ BEFORE RESPONDING TO THIS THREAD
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    If time allowed, I’d love to be able to help out everyone in search of lyrics in Pinyin. Unfortunately, however, I’m slow and I’ve got too many other things to take care of. So, again, I recommend running the lyrics in Chinese characters through Adso. Under Style, select Pinyin.
    Another possibility would be to post your requests to an online forum, such as Chinese Forums.

    Best of luck, everyone.
    ****************************
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  14. Sorry, lonely. I don’t think that site is yet ready to show the world. It seems to have only two songs at the moment, one of which has its title misspelled (“K?’ài n?rén,” not “ke ai ni ren”) and neither of which is in real Pinyin. Using proper word parsing is the first rule of Hanyu Pinyin, because Mandarin is made of words, bro ken syl la bles. This *cannot* be ignored.

    And then there’s the matter of tone marks.

    I hope you adjust your approach to use real Pinyin, because the Net could certainly use a large database of Mandarin lyrics in Hanyu Pinyin. Best of luck with your project.

  15. Hi,does anyone know Jacky Cheung – Zhen Ai lyrics in Han Yu Pin Yin?Anyone can translate or just post his lyrics?I really need it.It will be nice that someone can help me.Thank You.

  16. To those in need, it’s not very difficult to do your own translating into Pinyin using MDBG. I wrote up these directions a long time ago, but get a lot of traffic and good feedback about the method. You have to find the original Chinese lyrics first, but the Pinyin output is accurate and does most of the parsing automatically for you.

    http://farfromfrostburg.blogspot.com/2006/10/tutorial-translating-chinese-lyrics.html

    It’s not very effective for translating to English, however. Still, it’s a good learning tool for getting the rough meaning of some lyrics.

  17. Test out AMW168.COM

    Its tool translate all their Chinese albums name and tracks name. On the lyric page you could even use their pinyin english translator tool to translate Chinese words to pinyin and SOUND FILES.

    Nice lyric site and AWESOME tool.

  18. The song title is only Mama Hao…

    Shi Shang Zhi You Ma Ma Hao.
    You Ma De Hai Zi Xiang Ge Bao.
    Tou Jin Ma Ma De Huai Bao,
    Xing Fu Xiang Bu Liao.
    Mei You Ma Ma Zui Ku Nao,
    Mei Ma De Hai Zi Xiang Ke Cao,
    Li Kai Ma Ma De Huai Bao,
    Xing Fu Na Li Zhao?

  19. translation of songs of s.h.e. to english. please email me..

    >sweethoney_cutiepie11@yahoo.com.ph
    or u can recomend a site.

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