Introductions!

There are a wealth of resources online for singers, however the vast majority of the most well-known sites focus only on the "main" languages of the singing world (English, French, German, Italian, Latin and Spanish).  The goal of this site is to present the IPA for songs which fall outside of this category.  The initial focus of this work will be songs written in Czech, Portuguese, Russian and Swedish.  Initially song texts will be drawn from those songs which are public domain or in my own personal library.  I will also work by request on various songs as they are requisitioned in any language that I speak.  My hope is that this will be a valuable resource for singers.

In addition to art songs, I also plan to provide choral directors with an IPA resource for a number of choir pieces.  I have noticed that there is not a database of choir IPA and I feel that I can provide my services there.  These pieces will range in languages from English to Swedish and any other aforementioned language in between.  Again, I will also work on things per request as well.  Simply leave a comment on the main page and I will have your request done as speedily as I can.

If you have read my other blog at all, you will know that I have two main passions in life:  languages and singing.  My hope is that this blog will fuse the two passions into one project which will help many people.  The links to the left of the page comprise various resources for the singer, as well as a link to my other blog, Transitions.

Some explanations of markings:  In some cases you will see parentheses around letters, this is to mark letters that are not generally pronounced in the spoken language, but may be permissible in the sung language.  These matters are at the discretion of the singer and their coach/teacher.  Also, some of this IPA is my best work based on listening to natives and my own knowledge of the language.  This is only meant to be a general guide and the singer should still try to seek out a knowledgeable coach/teacher to fine tune their pronunciation, and then leave a comment of any corrections.

In general, if you are a native singer or someone very knowledgeable in the languages I post please leave comments with any suggestions or corrections to my work.  Thank you, and enjoy!