velarized /l/ and Billy Holiday

[Tom Zurinskas]

For an "l" I've got the tongue hitting the upper gums, not the velar region.  I can't conceive of "l" being called velar.

Tom Zurinskas, USA - CT20, TN3, NJ33, FL5+ 
see truespel.com


 
> Date: Fri, 6 Mar 2009 07:45:31 -0500
> From: hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM
> Subject: Re: velarized /l/ and Billy Holiday
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> 
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: velarized /l/ and Billy Holiday
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Wilson,
> 
> You got my point, and thanks for the observation on the vowel
> transition before /l/. My students always had problems with
> transcribing vowels before final /l/, which usually provided a good
> teaching opportunity.
> 
> Tom, on the other hand, misses the point as usual. Velarization, Tom,
> is not velar closure. The back of the tongue is raised but not high
> enough to touch the velum. This has a clear acoustic effect on the
> consonant, in this case /l/. You have some grasp of the "place of
> articulation" parameter, at least that it exists, but you seem totally
> unaware of the "manner of articulation" parameter. If you won't take
> a course, at least read a good text on phonetics. I recommend Peter
> Ladefoged's A Course in Linguistics, 5th ed. (Thomson Learning 2005).
> The book comes with a CD, so you'll be able to hear what sounds IPA
> symbols represent. You can also find the content of the CD on line at
> http://www.ladefogeds.com/course/contents.html.
> 
> Herb
> 
> On Fri, Mar 6, 2009 at 1:13 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> > Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject: Re: velarized /l/ and Billy Holiday
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > My WAG is that it's a feature of her dialect. BE doesn't have the
> > style of articulation that makes the pronunciation of, e.g. "cool" by
> > (Northern) white speakers sound to us like 'koo-wool" and causes BE
> > "cool" to sound like "coo" to white speakers. As a further
> > consequence, some BE speakers overcorrect, e.g. "table" to "taber"
> > [tEIbr].
> >
> > If I haven't missed your point.
> >
> > -Wilson
> > –––
> > All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> > come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> > -----
> > -Mark Twain
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Mar 5, 2009 at 10:06 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> >> Sender: Â Â Â American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster: Â Â Â Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> >> Subject: Â Â Â velarized /l/ and Billy Holiday
> >> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> This afternoon I was listening to a recording of Billy Holiday singing
> >> "Crazy he calls me." Â In the line "The impossible will take a little
> >> while" she has a schwa before the final /l/ of "impossible" and I
> >> don't hear any distinctive velarization of the /l/. Â There are several
> >> other post-vocalic /l/s in the song, and they don't show much
> >> velarization either. Â Post-vocalic /l/ is a consistent problem for
> >> American English singers, since the raising of the back of the tongue
> >> towards the velum constricts the oral cavity and reduces the overall
> >> resonance of the syllable coda. Â Some voice teachers and choral
> >> conductors will spend time training their singers to use only a
> >> non-velarized /l/, as a number European languages widely represented
> >> in the vocal and choral literature do. Â My CD of Billy is, of course,
> >> a copy, and I don't know how good the master was. Â It's entirely
> >> possible that the fidelity is not good enough to support much in the
> >> way of diction comments, but my impression is otherwise. Â Billy's
> >> diction is superb. Â Every word she sings is clear, even on a copy of a
> >> copy of a 1949 recording. Â Billy had little or no formal vocal
> >> training, so the fact that she doesn't velarize /l/ much, if at all,
> >> wouldn't be the result of vocal training. Â Is it a feature of her
> >> variety of AAE? Â Is it idiosyncratic to her distinctive vocal style?
> >>
> >> Herb
> >>
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> >>
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
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> >
> 
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