abstract:The four tones of Chinese poetry and dialectology () are four traditional tone classesA "tone class" is a lexical division of words based on tone. It may not have a direct correspondence with phonemic tone.
Then students have the daunting task of learning to pronounce Mandarin, where one word can have four meanings, depending on which of fourtones is used.
It's a major-key sound, but unlike our major keys, which have a half step between the third and fourth tones, the Lydian scale has a whole step there, and the half step between steps four and five.