独唱
dú chàng · HSK 7
to solo
🎤 独 (alone) + 唱 (sing) = singing alone, a solo performance
独 means alone or single, 唱 means to sing. One person standing on stage singing by themselves — thats a solo. The word literally spells out what a solo is: alone-sing.
独 — dog radical 犭 + 蜀 (phonetic)
A semantic-phonetic compound: 犭 (dog) gives the meaning, since dogs were thought to fight when kept together and so were often kept singly, while 蜀 supplies the sound. The original sense was 'solitary dog,' which broadened to 'alone, single, only.'
唱 — mouth 口 + 昌 (bright/prosperous, phonetic)
唱 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The mouth radical 口 signals an action done with the voice, while 昌 supplies the sound and originally meant 'bright' or 'flourishing.' Together they came to mean 'to sing' or 'lead in chanting,' extending to 'call out' or 'proclaim.'