Learn Spanish (Spain): El sonido es malo, ¿volvéis a cantar? - The sound is bad, are you singing again?

El sonido es malo, ¿volvéis a cantar?

The sound is bad, are you singing again?

Breakdown of El sonido es malo, ¿volvéis a cantar?

to do again (+ infinitive)

Questions & Answers about El sonido es malo, ¿volvéis a cantar?

How does volvéis a cantar mean 'are you singing again'?

To say you do something 'again' in Spanish, you use the verb volver followed by the preposition a and an infinitive verb (like cantar). Here, volvéis is the 'you all' form, so it literally means 'you all return to singing'.

Why is the verb conjugated as volvéis here?

Volvéis is the vosotros form, which is used in Spain to address a group of people informally, like 'you guys'. Since the speaker is talking to a group of singers they are familiar with, they use the plural informal 'you'.

Why does the sentence use es malo instead of está malo for the sound?

We use es (from the verb ser) because poor quality is described as a characteristic of the audio here. If you used está malo (from estar), it would sound strange because that phrase usually implies something is physically sick or has gone bad like spoiled food!

The English translation says 'are you singing', but isn't volvéis the simple present tense?

Exactly! In Spanish, the simple present tense is often used to talk about actions happening right now or immediate plans. English strongly prefers 'are you singing' for the present moment, but Spanish naturally uses the simple present volvéis a cantar here instead of a continuous form.