Breakdown of Singst du Peters Lied? Es ist toll.
sein
to be
du
you (informal singular)
es
it
Peter
Peter
toll
great
singen
to sing
das Lied
the song
Questions & Answers about Singst du Peters Lied? Es ist toll.
Why is there no apostrophe in Peters?
In German, when we show possession with proper names, we just add an -s to the end of the name. We do not use an apostrophe like we do in English! So "Peter's song" simply becomes Peters Lied.
Why does the first sentence start with the verb Singst?
To ask a yes/no question in German, you move the conjugated verb to the very front of the sentence. Since a normal statement would be Du singst (You sing), the question becomes Singst du? (Are you singing?).
How come the English translation says "Are you singing", but there is no word for "are" in the German sentence?
German does not have a separate "-ing" form (present continuous tense) like English does. The single present tense verb singst covers both "sing" and "are singing" depending on what makes the most sense in context.
Does the Es in the second sentence specifically refer to the song?
Yes! The word for song is a neuter noun in German (das Lied). Because of this, we must use the neuter pronoun es (it) when we refer back to it in the next sentence.
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