[General] Silhouettes

[beachboy]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI6EjGL9hTg


How does the singer pronounce the word "silhouettes" in this song? For some reason, my untrained ears hear /SOO - lits/.

 

[emsr2d2]

All the syllables are there. It's harder to hear them because each syllable of that word (and only that word) is sung very quickly. Most of the other words either have just one syllable, or take a whole beat of the music per syllable. Listen to "late last night" at the end of the first line. Each word takes one beat. When they come to sing "silhouettes", they fit it into the same length of time as "late", so they are singing 3 syllables in the same length of time it takes to sing "late".

 

[jutfrank]

Out of context, the word would be pronounced with stress on the final consonant. In the song, however, the stress is on the first.

 

[beachboy]

That's it, jutfrank. I understand that, in many songs, the singer changes the stressed syllable of certain words for obvious reasons. What really intrigued me was why the stressed syllable I am hearing is /SOO/, and not /SI/ or something.....

 

[jutfrank]

He uses /SI/, or at least a schwa-like vowel, which I assume your transcription /SOO/ represents. It's definitely not a long /OO/ vowel.

 

[emsr2d2]

I can't hear any trace of "Si" sounding like "Soo". As I said, the syllables are run together very quickly so I think you're hearing the "oo" of "lhou" at the same time as "si".