German and English are related, so a German lyric can look easy to translate. Then you hit a compound word that is a whole line on its own, or a verb waiting at the very end of a sentence. German and English are already set in the translator above, so paste the lyrics for a faithful translation, a singable version and notes.
German glues words together: Fernweh (longing for faraway places), Herzschmerz (heartache), Torschlusspanik (the fear that time is running out). One word can need a whole English phrase, which makes a singable line hard to keep short. The notes explain what a compound packs in.
In many German clauses the verb waits until the end, as in weil ich dich immer noch liebe. Lyricists use that to land the key word on the rhyme. English puts the verb early, so a singable English line often has to be rebuilt to end on a strong word.
Du is close and casual, Sie is formal. Songs almost always use du, so when one uses Sie, it is a choice: distance, irony or a very formal kind of courtesy. The notes mention it.
German words like Herbst or Angst stack consonants, and German melodies often use hard stops on the beat. English versions tend to flow more smoothly, which is fine, but sing the lines to check that the rhythm still lands.
Songs in Bavarian, Austrian German, Swiss German or Kölsch use words and spellings standard German does not. The translator reads common dialect words and says when it had to interpret one.
Two original lines, written for this page. Each has 10 syllables and ends on a stressed syllable.
Ich hab dein Lied im Radio gehört,
und plötzlich war der ganze Winter weg.
I heard your song on the radio,
and suddenly the whole winter was gone.
They played your song, I heard it on the air
and suddenly the winter wasn't there
German puts gehört, heard, at the very end of the first line, so it lands on a strong stressed syllable. The singable version keeps a strong ending by moving the radio into on the air, and ends the second line on there instead of gone. That keeps the stress pattern and happens to add a rhyme the German does not have. The faithful version stays closer to the words: the radio, the whole winter, gone.
Yes, for common dialect words and spellings. Lines written fully in a strong dialect such as Swiss German are harder, and the notes say when a word was interpreted.
The faithful version translates what the compound means, even if that takes several English words. The singable version looks for a shorter image with the same feeling, and the notes explain what the compound literally says.
Yes. Lines that rhyme in German still end in a rhyme or a close near rhyme in English, often on a different sound. To keep the rhyme it may change word order or an image, while keeping what the line is about.
Yes. You get one English line for each German line, in the same order, so it lines up with the original timing. Have a fluent speaker read it once if it is going out publicly.