need speech synthesizer

Does anybody have access to a good speech synthesizer and know how to use
it? I never learned how to pronounce French properly, and would like to do
so in the near future using this resource:

   http://www.jump-gate.com/languages/french/french1.html

My problem is that when I listen to the WAV files provided, they don't
jibe with the phonetic descriptions they give. Obviously, my ability to
hear foreign sounds correctly is inadequate. One of the worst problems I'm
having is the pronunciation of French 'e'. They say to pronounce it as a
syllabic voiced velar lateral approximant like the second "a" in
"marmalade", but that's not anything like what I hear in the sound file.

If somebody has a speech synthesizer for English, maybe you could
synthesize the French words provided as examples of these various sounds?
I'd especially like to practice hearing and articulating the velar lateral
when it precedes /r/ as in "heure" -- that's giving me no end of trouble.


Thanks!

-- Mark

Reply