Alveolar trill, rolling /r/ success stories

[Soclydeza]

I'm sure this question comes up every now and then but I figure there might be some fresh ideas, plus, I'll frame the question differently: who here has a success story with doing the alveolar trill (for Italian, Spanish, etc.)? I have been trying to learn how to do this for ages, have watched countless youtube videos, have made many funny sounds when I'm by myself and I still can't do it. I've been learning Italian and have just been doing the single flap /r/ in its place; I'm losing confidence that I have the physical ability to do it and it's frustrating, so I want to hear from anyone whose native language does not pronounce Rs in this way but have still been able to train themselves to do it.

Also, for those of you who possess such knowledge, what are some of the telltale physical characteristics of people who fall into that small "genetically unable" category?

[arthaey]

Back in junior high Spanish class (ages ago), I eventually learned in a rather zen-like way: but realizing that I couldn't consciously move my tongue fast enough, it only worked if I relaxed and let the air flow flap my tongue for me, rather like a reed or blowing on a blade of grass.

Granted, this explanation has not helped the two Spanish learners in my life pick up the sound, so YMMV.

[Axon]

Have you tried Gabriel Wyner's method the old stage actor method? Gabriel Wyner mentions it in one of his YouTube videos, but I can't seem to find it now. In short:

Say "Prince of Prussia" normally.

Now say "Pdince of Pdussia", replacing the Rs with Ds.

Say that over and over, faster and faster. The Ds should become taps, and in the context of the words you should be able to lengthen those taps into trills.

[jonm]

Hi Soclydeza, I think it's great that you're keeping at this despite finding it difficult. I know by now you're probably pretty familiar with the "theory" of how to make the trill, but I'll just mention a couple points.

As arthaey said, it's not a question of using the muscles of the tongue to move it back and forth, but rather a question of "setting" the tongue in a certain position and with a certain tension, such that when you add a powerful airflow, the back-and-forth motion happens on its own.

One point about the position of the tongue: I find that compared to my tongue position when making a [t] or [d] sound (I'm also a native English speaker from the US), the tongue position for the alveolar trill is just a tiny bit more curled back. The point of (intermittent) contact is not the relatively flat part of the alveolar ridge behind the teeth but the most convex part of the ridge. It's the very tip of the tongue that makes contact there, and the contact has to be loose enough or light enough that it can be blown apart.

As phonetician J.C. Catford puts it in A Practical Introduction to Phonetics (which has lots of great guided "experiments" and which I highly recommend):

Raise the tip of the tongue slightly and let it rest loosely against the extreme back of the ridge behind the upper teeth. Now start up a powerful pulmonic pressure initiatory air-stream (voiceless) i.e. blow hard.

Catford also suggests starting with the bilabial trill, which is easier for some people. The idea is that if you get the hang of any trill (bilabial, alveolar, or uvular), you have a felt sense of what's involved, which makes producing the others easier. Here's Catford on the bilabial trill in case it's helpful:

Place the upper and lower lips lightly together, in a somewhat 'pouting' posture—that is, kept perfectly flat (not rounded) but pushed forward so that it is the inner parts of lips that make contact. Now start up a powerful pulmonic pressure initiation ('blow hard') and, perhaps after a little adjustment of lip-tension and initiatory pressure, the lips will start flapping regularly, periodically, against each other.

I don't know the answer to your other question about what physical characteristics make it impossible for someone to produce the alveolar trill. I'm curious.

I don't know enough about this aspect of phonetics to say for sure, but it's possible that when you practice making the sound, you're developing the tongue muscles involved in the gesture, so even if the trill doesn't start up, it could be beneficial that you're working at it.

The main thing, I think, is to continue making fine adjustments to what you're doing. I think if you do that, odds are good that you'll hit on it. Good luck!

[Doitsujin]

Have you tried Gabriel Wyner's method?

Actually, this method wasn't invented by Wyner. It's a very old method that is often attributed to a famous French stage actor whose name I've forgotten.
It definitely worked for me, however I mostly used monosyllabic words such as "tdip" (which eventually became "trip").

BTW, a good song to practice your rolling Rs is singing the refrain of Emiliana Torrini's silly song Jungle Drum:



Also check out the following Youtube video, which explains how to avoid some common pitfalls when learning the rolling R:



If mastering the rolling R is really important to you and you have the money, you could also pay for a couple of lessons with a voice coach (most stage actors and opera singers need to master the rolling R) or maybe a speech pathologist in a country where the R is traditionally rolled.

BTW, in many countries where the R is traditionally rolled there are regions where it isn't rolled. IIRC, in Italy, the non-rolling (uvular) R is called "erre moscia" (= dull R) and often spoken by Italians from Northern Italy.

I.e., you could always claim that you learned your Italian in Northern Italy.

[tastyonions]

Italy does have the "R moscia" that is heard fairly often but I don't think there is any Spanish-speaking region with an equivalent. When I hear a uvular R in Spanish I immediately think "Oh, a French person / German speaking Spanish."

Ankyloglossia is one condition that may make the alveolar trill difficult:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankyloglossia

(Edit: it seems some parts of Puerto Rico use a uvular R!: https://dialectoboricua.com/2013/06/21/ ... -problema/)

[anamsc]

Italy does have the "R moscia" that is heard fairly often but I don't think there is any Spanish-speaking region with an equivalent. When I hear a uvular R in Spanish I immediately think "Oh, a French person / German speaking Spanish."

Ankyloglossia is one condition that may make the alveolar trill difficult:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankyloglossia

(Edit: it seems some parts of Puerto Rico use a uvular R!: https://dialectoboricua.com/2013/06/21/ ... -problema/)

Costa Rica and parts of Chile also use an alveolar or retroflex approximant instead of a trill.

[tarvos]

I used that d-to-r trick in my early twenties when learning Russian! I can do the trill now. It was suggested to me by my mother, who is a speech therapist.

[smallwhite]

I started to practise this trill once in a while about a year before I needed it, reading and watching a few instructions and saying te-de-te-de etc for maybe 10 minutes maybe two three times a month. Felt little improvement. Didn't feel the tongue "looser" or anything.

What finally and significantly helped was (1) realising that the alveolar trill was the same kind of thing as the bilabial trill (?) that I could already do, and (2) realising that I was breathing/voicing wrong - once I realised this, I was able to trill right away:
- tedetede or teletele etc were more aspirated unvoiced consonant practice
- the (Spanish?) alveolar trill is a voiced consonant. Your breathing/voicing should be the same as that for aaaaa iiiiii uuuuu etc.

After further practice, I was able to trill unvoiced and standing on just one leg.

[StringerBell]

IIRC, in Italy, the non-rolling (uvular) R is called "erre moscia" (= dull R) and often spoken by Italians from Northern Italy.

I.e., you could always claim that you learned your Italian in Northern Italy.

My husband and all his family and friends are in/from northern Italy (Lombardia) and all of them roll Rs the "normal way". My husband had trouble rolling Rs as a kid, and apparently this isn't uncommon for children, but as an adult he rolls Rs with no issue. I think he had some speech therapy for this, though I'm not 100% about that. I don't want to claim to be an expert since it's not my native language, but when I've come across recordings of Italians who don't roll Rs and asked him about it, he said that it's sort of like a speech impediment, it's not a regional-specific thing; some people just physically can't roll Rs.

At the beginning, it was something I struggled with, but I did the best I could and over time my ability to roll Rs slowly got better. For me, what was important was to 1) not be lazy and give into the English way of saying it, and 2) to not stress about it. Even now, I have days where I can roll Rs really impressively and other days where I struggle a bit and my mouth just doesn't want to cooperate. I think the previous suggestion for using a "zen approach" is a good one, as long as it doesn't turn into a "giving up on it" approach.