Pronunciation watch

[Stillhomewardbound]

We've been here before OFCACHAP ... It's Lyttelton.

[Threni]

Never really bothered me, I once had a music student pronnounce a name in correct once, I was soon off the mark to correct him but the score was the French edition ;)

"Strawinsky" haha

[mikerotheatrenestr0y]

I'd wait for the third offence before tongue-slitting. I mean, it's the same thing as with teachers: if they don't know at least as much as me, and preferably more, then why are they doing the job? More to the point - why are they being ALLOWED to do the job? Should I go on about doctors, dentists, electricians and plumbers? Probably not.

[Nick Armstrong]

Foreign pronunciation is one thing but it's surely justifiable to expect presenters to get reasonably basic English words right?

On Thursday, introducing Ravel's "Daphnis & Chloë", Dr Sarah Walker referred to the tumult of the Danse Générale. 'Danse Générale' she got right .... but 'tumult' she pronounced:

"tumm - ult"

(iPlayer, Thursday morning, around 1hr 41 mns 35s in to the programme)

Now after an initial and a few I started to wonder if there's some regional variation in the pronunciation of that word. But then, a lot of my relations come from the same part of the world as Dr Walker, and I spent a lot of my early years there... Never heard that pronunciation (but then again, did anyone ever refer to 'tumult' in my presence?)...

I suspect it's just a case of someone not being familiar with the word. In which case: further and

[vinteuil]

sometimes people have encountered words in their reading before hearing them pronounced. A precocious reader, as a child I often provoked hilarity for my brothers and parents with my mispronunciations - mishap to rhyme with bishop, misled as myz'ld, bedraggled as bed-raggled...

[Chris Newman]

After 33 years in the central South West I have slipped into to pronouncing the vowel of say Bath (like "bat") as do many people in that city rather than Bath (like "bart"). My sisters back in West Sussex find it funny. I do not worry too much about local pronunciations but have a little inner wobbly when people say "pronounciation" which is mental mispelling.

I remember with amusement a situation at a talk for opera lovers where an entire audience and the speaker were left sitting on their hands and biting thumbs when a rather pompous questioner asked Arthur Jacobs a convoluted question about the Commendatore's Sarcophagus. He pronounced it SARKO PHARGUS.

Edited afterthought: I should say the audience either sat or bit..........doing both at once is a trifle difficult.

[Nick Armstrong]

sometimes people have encountered words in their reading before hearing them pronounced. A precocious reader, as a child I often provoked hilarity for my brothers and parents with my mispronunciations - mishap to rhyme with bishop, misled as myz'ld, bedraggled as bed-raggled...

Very true Vinteuil. My personal example is the word "initial" - when I was little, there was a local dry cleaners called Initial, and seeing their vans driving around, I pronounced it "inny-tea-al" in my head... But it wasn't long before I gathered how it should be pronounced... I don't think I ever said it out loud like that, certainly not as an adult, and certainly not while broadcasting on national radio...

[french frank]

After 33 years in the central South West I have slipped into to pronouncing the vowel of say Bath (like "bat") as do many people in that city rather than Bath (like "bart"). My sisters back in West Sussex find it funny.

An interesting one. We had friends who had a farm near Wells, the parents were quite 'Somerset' but the children RP. They always said Glahstonbury (as in 'glass' rather than 'gas'). I've also always said Glahstonbury but under national pressure I'm switching to the short 'a'. [Bath, of course, is Baaaaahth, as in what I have every Sunday, like Norman Pitkin ]

[kernelbogey]

A sweet story from an interesting talk by a film director on R3 several years ago: in the Indian city he was visiting he was recommended, for transport of film equipment etc, to patronise [assume Indian accent] 'the Cambree Jay Haulage Company'.

It turned out that the company was in fact the Cambridge Haulage Company. Intrigued, he investigated and found that it had originally owned trucks which had a bulge in the tailboard. The signwriter had split the word Cambri - dge across this.... hence the local pronunciation.

[vinteuil]

my mispronunciations - mishap to rhyme with bishop, misled as myz'ld, bedraggled as bed-raggled...

... and also awry as orr-ee...

[mikerotheatrenestr0y]

"Mizzled" is a real word [though no doubt formed by popular etymology from a mispronunciuation]; and Mizzle occurs as a "speaking" character name in C19 Drama. Surely Glaston rhymes with Shaston [nobody says Shaftesbury]? It's not the long RP, but a different vowel, also long, not the flat a of flat-cap-land - more like the sheep-bleat sound of Baaaath.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Listening to Classic FM yesterday evening, they were playing Jorge Bolet's recording of "Chapelle de Guillaume Tell" from Liszt's "Années de Pélerinages (Suisse)". The announcer told us it was "Liszt's Chapel of William Tell, from Annays de Perrinarge, played by George Bolette".

[Panjandrum]

Listening to Classic FM yesterday evening, they were playing Jorge Bolet's recording of "Chapelle de Guillaume Tell" from Liszt's "Années de Pélerinages (Suisse)". The announcer told us it was "Liszt's Chapel of William Tell, from Annays de Perrinarge, played by George Bolette".

Was it Katie Derham or Sarah Walker moonlighting?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Was it Katie Derham or Sarah Walker moonlighting?

Oh, gosh, no. If you had heard this (man) you would have been quite convinced that the two ladies in question were nothing less than perfect. (I like both of them.)

[Uncle Monty]

I know how a Hispanophone would say it, but as long as I can remember it's been George Bollette on the radio! I assumed that was what he used for international consumption.