Thread: Reciting "И скучно и грустно"

Hi, I was hoping to get some feedback on my accent and perhaps intonation. I've been studying Russian for 3 years. I have an idea about a few of my issues and I'd like to hear what y'all have to say. I chose a great, albeit sad, poem to recite. Don't hold back on me. I'd really like to improve so any and all recommendations are welcome. Thanks!!

Нужно исправлять следующие звуки:

- душЭвной невзгоды (звук "э", не "е")
- а годы проходЯТ
- любить но кого ЖЭ (не нужно смягчать эти звуки)
- а ВЕЧно (это кстати распространенная ошибка, все говорят "въечно")
- сладкий недуГ
- раЗЛУки
- и жизНЬ (мягкий звук "н")
- вокрУг (не "вокрЮг")
- глупая шУтка (не "шЮтка")

А звук "р" у Вас очень хороший!

Спасибо! Kак я ожидал, большинство проблем с палатализацией.
И слово <Разлуки> не существует в этом стихотворении. Я очевидно ужасно произнес <рассудке>))

Originally Posted by kybarry

Спасибо! Kак я ожидал, большинство проблем с палатализацией.
И слово <Разлуки> не существует в этом стихотворении. Я очевидно ужасно произнес <рассудке>))

А почему "рассудке", а не "рассудка"? Ш, Ж must be fully hard, velarized. Время, не "врэмя". "Ведь" sounds "вьет" or something like that, I had to guess this word.
In general, your pronunciation is good.

Making your Ж and Ш right will improve you pronounciation greatly, and it is already pretty good. Aaand that will be easy. In English SH ("shame") and zh ("pleaSure") sounds are pronounced with your tongue quite close to your teeth, touching the alveolar ridge just behind them. What you need, is slightly "hook" it back. American English "R" gives a good idea about how you do it. Only don't try too hard: certainly, you can curve it all the way back (don't swallow it, though), but the actual difference between tongue tip position in Russian and English SH is very little, less than a centimetre.The point is, the manner of articulation significantly affects the amount of "friction" heard when the air passes through the mouth, which in Russian SH is much less.

Soft "Р" in "время" doesn't sound convincing, but it's difficult to give a specific advice, the consonant is pretty hard as it is. Try acting the same way as with many other palatalized consonants employing your tongue tip: change the tip to the blade. That is, use a sligtly larger area at the upper side of your tongue, including the one just behind the tip, rather then tip alone.

"Исчезнет" is actually pronounced as if it were "ищезнет". "Сч" is one of these standard consonant combination that are usually read slightly differently from how they are spelt. There are many more words with this combination: счастье (happiness), считать (to count), расчёска (comb, brush for combing your hair)
"Скучно" in literary laguage is pronounced with Ш ("скушно"), same as "конечно", but you may very well ignore this one, as "скучно" is heard just as often, if not more often. Actors are trained to say "скушно", though A bit more conservative of a pronunciation. Be aware that "конечно" is different in that "ШН" is stable there. "Конечно" with "ЧН" doesnt mean "of course". It is short form adjective "finite" (rather than infinite, endless).

Not bad, just make it sound not so soft.... Out of curiosity, are you English?

Thanks for the replies! Marcus, you're of course correct, the word in the poem is рассудка.
It is definitely difficult for me to distinguish clearly my soft "р" and my hard one. Clearly, I get tricked by Ж and Ш always being pronounced hard. I think that is fixable and I'll work on it. Hopefully my upcoming year in St. Petersburg will help a lot!
Alexsms, I am not English if you mean to ask if I'm from England. However, I am American so my native language is English. Maybe I'll post another recitation to see if I can fix some of these mistakes. Thanks again!

Originally Posted by kybarry

Alexsms, I am not English if you mean to ask if I'm from England. However, I am American so my native language is English. Maybe I'll post another recitation to see if I can fix some of these mistakes. Thanks again!

i see, it was just not easy to understand from the accent where you are from, which is probably good, linguistically speaking, because you don't have a distinct American accent while reciting in Russian.