Is knowledge of word tone necessary for singer's diction?
I'm not planning on tackling the business of learning Chinese (or any other tonal language) any time soon, but this something about which I have been wondering, in the meantime:
Since childhood, I have used "singer's diction" to sing songs in languages I do not speak (Italian, Latin, Spanish). I am wondering if the same is possible for Asian (tonal) languages.
To illustrate, here is a video in which the lyrics of a Chinese song are rendered in latin characters:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Qopry2-5WE
If I sang the consonant and vowel sounds I read in a way that carefully matches the melody I hear, would the words be understandable?
Might there still be subtle tone shifts in the melody which are difficult for me to hear and reproduce?
Am I misunderstanding the concept of "tone" (by thinking it's related to melody)?
Does word tone behave differently in singing than it does in normal speach?

Question

Is knowledge of word tone necessary for singer's diction?
I'm not planning on tackling the business of learning Chinese (or any other tonal language) any time soon, but this something about which I have been wondering, in the meantime:
Since childhood, I have used "singer's diction" to sing songs in languages I do not speak (Italian, Latin, Spanish).  I am wondering if the same is possible for Asian (tonal) languages.
To illustrate, here is a video in which the lyrics of a Chinese song are rendered in latin characters:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Qopry2-5WE
If I sang the consonant and vowel sounds I read in a way that carefully matches the melody I hear, would the words be understandable?
Might there still be subtle tone shifts in the melody which are difficult for me to hear and reproduce?
Am I misunderstanding the concept of "tone" (by thinking it's related to melody)?
Does word tone behave differently in singing than it does in normal speach?

Answer

It is difficult to answer with "yes" or "no". 

There are four tones in Chinese.The first tone is high and level, the second raising, the third falling raising and the forth falling. 

For example, "天"meaning "day" is first tone, high and level. But when being sung in song, it possibly could be low, falling, raising or first raising and then falling. It depends on the melody of the song. 

Look,it sounds that the knowledge of the word tone is not necessary for singer's diction in Chinese.Maybe it is true. But the truth is that the words could be difficult to understand when a foreiger who has never studied Chinese singing, because he might pronounce the consonant and vowel wrong. 

Sure, if he sing the song that every chinese kowns, the words will be understood no matter how bad he pronounces. 

I guess so.

Answer

Someone said , If you can learn Japanese, Learning French should be a piece of cake. 

But not all the language have same rules and tonal in prononciation. 

And this 男儿当自强 isn't original mandarin singing. the singer is from Hong Kong. But He pronouce slowly and incorrectlly then you can model his month easily. Asian language's tone and melody is the same with charactor's prononciation on any songs. like english song and other language song. their prononcition is same. 

My english is less than you. But I can listen that easier than you hear chinese. Just chinese is too hard.