Rrrrolling Russian R

Hello everybody!

Now this may be a question best answered by a native Russian speaker: not sure if the trilled ‘R’ in Spanish is the same as in Russian.

I understand that it is the uplifted flattering loose tip of the tongue, which should produce the proper Russian r-sound.

Does the proper Russian R come only from the tip of the tongue or also from the throat, or is it a combination?

Usually my R’s are guttural and come from the throat, a bit like gargling.

When I try to exercise the rolling RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-sound, I definitely feel my tongue trill, but I also still get a lot of input from the throat.

Nevertheless, concentrating on my tongue placement a word like По русскй seem come out much better. Do I need to work more on suppressing involvement of the throat?

Thank you!

1 Like

Hi ! =)))

You are absolutely right! =)))

Spanish ‘r’ is exactly what you need! =))) You may also consider Austrian ‘r’ as an example to follow! =)))

Of course, normally, no guttural ‘r’ is used in Russian, but as it has no distinctive function, i.e. does not affect the meaning of any word at all, you may initially use both! =))) By the way, some Russians do use a guttural ‘r’ which is considered to be a defect of speech in Russian, but there’s no problem to understand them in Russian, at all ! =)))

Besides, I know this mistake with nearly every beginner of Russian, they all both write and pronounce ‘in Russian’ as “По-русскЙ”! =))) No, it is not! =)))) It should be “по-русскИ” which is literally translated as ''auf Russisch" ! =)))

There’s huge lot of concepts absolutely similar in German and in Russian, as Russian borrowed huge lot of linguistic aspects from German long time ago! =)))

1 Like

Thanks for your input pauler! I think after some voice exercises yesterday evening, I awoke this morning with the ability of a speaking a trilling R from the tip of my tongue alongside my usual guttural German one, amasing how the brain processes things during sleep!

I know my spelling still sucks, in my defence I copied and pasted it and haven’t yet written down a single Russian word - I am still more in my listening phase.

1 Like