Western singers sing in fluid, multi-syllabic streams of speech, whereas Chinese singing, given the nature of the language, lays more stress on the individual work, giving full attention to a certain expression before moving on to the next.
例如西洋歌劇在演唱時，習慣「以腔托字」，中文歌劇則是「以字行腔」，唱腔的旋律由語文來衍生，什麼樣的語文就有什麼樣的旋律。