music
HSK level
音乐 is written with 14 strokes (音: 9, 乐: 5). The animation replays automatically.
音乐 (yīnyuè) is the Chinese word for 'music' as an art form, a category, and the general phenomenon of organised sound — everything from classical to pop to film scores.
It is a compound of 音 'sound' + 乐 'joy, pleasure' (read yuè here, not lè), so the literal sense is 'sounds of pleasure'. Two things English speakers should note. First, 音乐 refers to music as a whole or as a category; an individual song is 歌 (gē) or 歌曲 (gēqǔ), and a piece of instrumental music is 曲子 (qǔzi).
You 听音乐 ('listen to music') in general but 唱歌 ('sing songs') for individual pieces. Second, the second character 乐 has two readings: lè 'happy' (快乐) and yuè 'music' (音乐). The yuè reading appears only in music-related compounds.
Character by character
Memory hook: 音 (sound) + 乐 (pleasure) = sounds that bring pleasure = music.
音乐 appears in 2 Fluentide podcast episodes at natural native speed — each with the full Chinese script, pinyin, and line-by-line English translation.
我喜欢听音乐。
Wǒ xǐhuān tīng yīnyuè.
I like listening to music.
spoken
她在学音乐。
Tā zài xué yīnyuè.
She is studying music.
spoken
今天晚上有一个音乐会。
Jīntiān wǎnshang yǒu yí ge yīnyuèhuì.
There's a concert tonight.
neutral
我最喜欢中国的古典音乐。
Wǒ zuì xǐhuān Zhōngguó de gǔdiǎn yīnyuè.
I like Chinese classical music best.
neutral
音乐让人快乐。
Yīnyuè ràng rén kuàilè.
Music makes people happy.
written
歌曲 means '(vocal) song' — a specific composition with words. 音乐 is the broader 'music' category, including instrumental. Listening to '一首歌曲' is listening to one song; listening to '音乐' is listening to music in general.
乐曲 is a more formal / written word for 'a musical piece / composition', typically instrumental. 音乐 is the umbrella term in everyday speech.
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