How to pronounce the alveolar trilled r

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Hello,

I've been recently studying another language, Spanish, but have difficulty with rolling my r's.
I can fake it with a sound from deep in my throat, but my searching tells me that the trilled r is made by the vibrating of the tongue (naturally, not manually).

I would like to ask if anyone can either tell me how to accomplish this or know of any good tutorials/articles/et cetera to fully grasp how to do it. I also extend this to any language that has this alveolar trilled r such as Italian.

This article, "10 Amazing Tips For Pronouncing The Letter 'R' In Spanish"'s number 9 (quoted below) helped me, but I'm not sure I'm pronouncing it quite right yet.

9. Alternatively, relax and pretend you're a child making the sound of a revving-up motor.

(And no, I'm not literally sounding like a motorcycle each time I try to say a Spanish word with "rr", but it helps me get a feel for it for imitating it after I do the "revving-up motor" sound.)

I don't know if it's because I'm doing it wrong or just because it's going to take practice, or both.

I do not think I'll have as much trouble with the other sounds in Spanish, especially given the fact that many sounds in Spanish are similar to that of Japanese, but if there's something I ought to be aware of, feel free to let me know.

Have some lIlI sprites, since they're so cute ->

 

[Geranium]

What's that bumpy part in the mouth between the roof and teeth called? the hard palate?
Anyway whatever it is putting the tip of the tongue near it (but not touching) and then pushing out more and more air before the tongue starts to roll has worked for a couple of people i know

 

[ZAR-PARTY | ЦАРЬ-ПАРТИ]

I'm no linguist, so I don't know if my Russian R sound is called alveolar or not, but it's a very distinct rolling R. To mimic a Spanish accent is no challenge for me and when I started learning Japanese, I didn't have to practice the sounds because my native Russian and German did already cover all of them. In fact, Japanese is the only language where people don't tell me I had a Russian accent.

Not sure if this is helpful but you can try to make your tongue "stay straight->forward in a line". When I compare my Russian R to my German, American or British R (those 3 sound the same to me though), it seems that the Russian R makes my tongue go up in a straight line, while the American R only moves the tip of my tongue up.

 

[Hatsune-hakase]

Not to be discouraging, but when I encountered the same difficulty when trying to learn some Russian, I learned that apparently some people simply can't do the trilled R--even if it's a sound in their native language! (I've heard that Vladimir Ilyich Lenin--yes that Lenin--couldn't trill his Rs!) I may be one of those people, because I can't trill my Rs to save my life. And though that may not be surprising because I am a native speaker of American English, which doesn't have the trilled R, I know lots of others who can--including one of my siblings! Again, I don't want to be discouraging; I'm not saying that just because you're having some difficulty that you can NEVER do it. But it's something to be aware of.

You're right that the trilled R doesn't come from the back of the throat--that's more guttural, almost like a growl. Rather, it's the tip of the tongue that's vibrating. I got to a point where I could get the tip of my tongue to vibrate well enough (though it still didn't sound quite right), but I could only really do it in isolation. It was extremely hard for me to transition from one sound--vowel or consonant--into the trill. Maybe I just needed more practice.

A compromise that I resort to is doing a sort of "tapped" R--actually a lot like the Japanese R/L consonant in ra, ri, ru, re, ro (ら、り、る、れ、ろ). Of course it's not the same sound, but it's a lot closer than a full-on rhotic R.

 

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@Geranium - Thank->You! I think I've seen something like that in my research. I'm not sure I have quite grasped this yet, but maybe I just need to practice this more.

@ZAR-PARTY - One site I came across said Russian has two different kinds of trilled Rs, I think one of them being like Spanish's, so I suppose one of them is alveolar. So, keep my tongue straight-forward? Basically don't curl it back or anything? Thanks!

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Not sure if this is helpful but you can try to make your tongue "stay straight->forward in a line".

Nice pun!

@Hatsune-hakase - No worries! I've seen that in my researching as well that some people just can't do it. I'd like to at least try and work for it to see if I can, but we'll have to see.
I think the regular Spanish r is like the Japanese r (at least similar), and I think I can pronounce that okay? (At least, hopefully I've been pronouncing it at least close.) Thank you, though!

 

[ZAR-PARTY | ЦАРЬ-ПАРТИ]

@ZAR-PARTY - One site I came across said Russian has two different kinds of trilled Rs, I think one of them being like Spanish's, so I suppose one of them is alveolar. So, keep my tongue straight-forward? Basically don't curl it back or anything? Thanks!
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Hmm... That's actually not true. We have three E's (Е, Ё, Э), two I's (И, Й), two Sh's that sound slightly different (Ш, Щ) and an extra vowel (Ы) and more stuff but only one R (Р). They probably meant that the R sound can be "softened" if there is a Ь after it. The letters Ь and Ъ don't have a sound, they only change sounds. Ь is used to "soften" the previous consonant and can be used for EVERY consonant. If this is the second R sound that the site meant then it would mean that all Russian consonants have two sounds.
For example you can copy & paste the words "царь" and "пар" (two syllables of my name) and listen how the Google Translate lady pronounces it.
Ь and Ъ are also used to separate the previous consonant. Example: "chi" (чи) becomes "chyi" (чьи), "podest" (подест) becomes "podyest" (подъест). Because Ь does always soften the consonant, Ъ is used in cases when the consonant does not have to sound soft.
But, yeah, the site was not right because Ь can change the sound of every constant, not only R.

 

[Move->Forward]

Hmm... That's actually not true. We have three E's (Е, Ё, Э), two I's (И, Й), two Sh's that sound slightly different (Ш, Щ) and an extra vowel (Ы) and more stuff but only one R (Р). They probably meant that the R sound can be "softened" if there is a Ь after it. The letters Ь and Ъ don't have a sound, they only change sounds. Ь is used to "soften" the previous consonant and can be used for EVERY consonant. If this is the second R sound that the site meant then it would mean that all Russian consonants have two sounds.
For example you can copy & paste the words "царь" and "пар" (two syllables of my name) and listen how the Google Translate lady pronounces it.
Ь and Ъ are also used to separate the previous consonant. Example: "chi" (чи) becomes "chyi" (чьи), "podest" (подест) becomes "podyest" (подъест). Because Ь does always soften the consonant, Ъ is used in cases when the consonant does not have to sound soft.
But, yeah, the site was not right because Ь can change the sound of every constant, not only R.

Hm, it may be the hard and soft R that the site spoke about. Here's the site if you're curious.
I think I forgot it said the R was close but not exactly an alveolar trill.

 

[hamano]

I too had problems with trilling R before I went to school. On first grade I had to go to a speech therapist for twice a week until I learned to pronounce R correctly. (Finnish R is trilled) Nowadays I actually find the English R a bit difficult, since I pronounce trilled R so naturally.
It's not that uncommon for Finnish kids to need extra practice to learn R. And as stated, a small number of people can never do it, but I think you just need practice and you'll be good!

Unfortunately I can't really remember how I was taught to pronounce R. But basically you produce the sound in a way Geranium explained. I'm not sure if this is valid advice, but you should keep the back of your tongue somewhat tense (not too much/forcefully) and the tip of your tongue relaxed. The tongue should be in a bit of a U-shape too.All it takes is practice and maybe find examples and try to imitate what you hear.
It's a bit like whistling in a way that it's hard to explain how to do it, it just takes some practice and trial and error.