Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Count Lucanor]

[Papus79]

[Papus79]

[Steve3007]

Is it fricative? I thought it sounded like the regular vibrant R of all we Spanish speaking people.

Yes, that's what I meant. Maybe "fricative" is not the right word, but you know what I mean.

As I said earlier, it's also a French thing, as in the Charles Aznavour that you posted earlier. Edith Piaf saying "r-r-rien" in "Je Ne Regrette Rien" is another good one. I love it, but can't seem to do it myself! My other half speaks fluent French and she's great at it. That's one of the interesting things about the sounds of the first/native language and the way that native speakers of some languages, after a certain age, generally have trouble with particular sounds in other languages.

[Steve3007]

"Uvular trill" seems to be the term for it. Interesting to see the distribution in languages of European origin of the "voiced uvular trill" versus the "voiceless uvular trill" (at least according Wikipedia).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_uvular_trill
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_uvular_trill

[Papus79]

[Count Lucanor]

Is it fricative? I thought it sounded like the regular vibrant R of all we Spanish speaking people.

Yes, that's what I meant. Maybe "fricative" is not the right word, but you know what I mean.

As I said earlier, it's also a French thing, as in the Charles Aznavour that you posted earlier. Edith Piaf saying "r-r-rien" in "Je Ne Regrette Rien" is another good one. I love it, but can't seem to do it myself! My other half speaks fluent French and she's great at it. That's one of the interesting things about the sounds of the first/native language and the way that native speakers of some languages, after a certain age, generally have trouble with particular sounds in other languages.

"Uvular trill" seems to be the term for it. Interesting to see the distribution in languages of European origin of the "voiced uvular trill" versus the "voiceless uvular trill" (at least according Wikipedia).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_uvular_trill
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_uvular_trill

Perhaps I'm missing something from the video of the recently deceased lady. What I get is that she uses the typical R that most native Spanish speaker use (there are regional exceptions, such as some parts in the Caribbean, Costa Rica and Chile). This is definitely a different R than the French use, as well as Germans, which is what you correctly describe as fricative or uvular trill. Spanish speakers often struggle to get that sound, too, so Aznavour and Piaf (as any other French) sound exotic to us.

[Count Lucanor]

[Count Lucanor]

[Papus79]

[Steve3007]

What I get is that she uses the typical R that most native Spanish speaker use (there are regional exceptions, such as some parts in the Caribbean, Costa Rica and Chile). This is definitely a different R than the French use, as well as Germans, which is what you correctly describe as fricative or uvular trill. Spanish speakers often struggle to get that sound, too, so Aznavour and Piaf (as any other French) sound exotic to us.

Perhaps that's why the distinction seems to be made between the voiced and voiceless uvular trill? According to those two Wikipedia articles that I cited, the voiced uvular trill happens in northern and eastern France, and Germany, but not in Spain, whereas the voiceless uvular trill happens in Spain.

If I listen to the audio samples in those two articles, the voiceless one does sound (to my untrained ear) more Spanish than the voiced one, which sounds more French to me.

[Papus79]

[Count Lucanor]

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What I get is that she uses the typical R that most native Spanish speaker use (there are regional exceptions, such as some parts in the Caribbean, Costa Rica and Chile). This is definitely a different R than the French use, as well as Germans, which is what you correctly describe as fricative or uvular trill. Spanish speakers often struggle to get that sound, too, so Aznavour and Piaf (as any other French) sound exotic to us.

Perhaps that's why the distinction seems to be made between the voiced and voiceless uvular trill? According to those two Wikipedia articles that I cited, the voiced uvular trill happens in northern and eastern France, and Germany, but not in Spain, whereas the voiceless uvular trill happens in Spain.

If I listen to the audio samples in those two articles, the voiceless one does sound (to my untrained ear) more Spanish than the voiced one, which sounds more French to me.

I had not noticed, by now I just listened to the samples. The voiceless one is definitely not typical Spanish and for what I see in the article, it is spoken in the Ponce Dialect by Puerto Ricans. Now, I don't know about this dialect, but I'm familiar with the Puerto Rican Spanish accent, which is among the exceptions in the Caribbean that I talked about. They pronounce the R close to an L, so if they say Puerto Rican it will sound more like Puelto Lican. In the Dominican Republic this is a little more exaggerated and something similar happens in some parts of Cuba.

Interestingly, the voiced one sounded more closely to the common Spanish R, but looking at the article the difference seems to be that the Spanish one is done with the tip of the tongue.

Now, since this is a musical thread, here is a late Puerto Rican that get his Rs with the typical Spanish accent. This song is a legendary Salsa tune:

[Count Lucanor]

[Papus79]

One of my first concerts - saw these guys on their tour for Filth Pig, where they mostly played this album and Psalm 69. Great show nonetheless.