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Pronunciation of French perfumes and designers

post #1 of 33
10/12/10 at 4:36am
Thread Starter 
Hi,

Yesterday, after someone had asked how to pronounce the tongue twister 'Fille en Aiguilles', I was deleted from MUA for posting the URL of a site I created for its members and for anyone interested in being able to pronounce the names of French perfumes and designers correctly.

Unlike some bloggers, I do not get any advantage - financial or otherwise - from posting sound files on Frag Name of the Day, apart from the knowledge that I am providing a service so I hope it is OK to post the URL here (there was a thread about it when I first created the site, but that was months ago and I expect new members join Basenotes all the time).

http://belabela.posterous.com

I welcome requests. TIA :-)
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post #2 of 33
10/12/10 at 8:07am
Great idea! I love perfume, I think I know a decent amount but I don't know french or how to pronounce it correctly so I end out sounding like and idiot when trying to say their names so I appreciate it!
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post #3 of 33
10/12/10 at 8:16am
That's funny, I was looking at your site just last night!! And, I'm reading reviews of various French language self-taught programs... I wish some other language were the language of perfume! (a phonetically-spelled language would be nice, like Spanish or German!). I really do feel like I'm handicapped, as I can't even recognize the name of a favorite perfume when it's spoken correctly! (as opposed to the way I "say" it in my mind!)
Anyway, great site, and I'm sure lots of basenoters, who don't already know about it, will enjoy the link.
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post #4 of 33
10/12/10 at 8:34am
Bela,
Your expertise is very much welcome here! I found your site through a thread on the guy's forum some time ago- thanks for refreshing the info on the gal's side.
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post #5 of 33
10/12/10 at 8:42am
Frag Name of the Day has been one of my favorite frag resources ever since I found it via The Dry Down (http://thedrydown.com) several months ago. Thank you so much for doing what you do!
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post #6 of 33
10/12/10 at 9:32am
Here is an old thread.

Just two days ago, a snooty SA looked down her nose and called "Estee Lauder" as "Es-tea Lauder." Hey, didn't she see the accent aigu over the first "e" at all?

http://www.basenotes.net/threads/227...ciation-Thread
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post #7 of 33
10/12/10 at 10:07am
Wonderful!!! Thank you!
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post #8 of 33
10/12/10 at 10:28am
Fee uhn i-Gee for Fille en Aiguilles. The g is a hard g, like "guh". Does that make sense?
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post #9 of 33
10/12/10 at 11:36am
Definitely a good idea! I do laugh at how different the actual pronunciations are from how I read them in my head. It can be very different sometimes!
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post #10 of 33
10/12/10 at 12:58pm
Oh that was fun!
Language lessons from a true Parisienne! tried almost all the names on the site!
Been AWOL too long now! Back to work!
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post #11 of 33
10/12/10 at 1:33pm
Thank you for the link, I thoroughly enjoyed it and I'm sure I'll be referring to it often.
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post #12 of 33
10/12/10 at 4:36pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by blondex199667 View Post

Fee uhn i-Gee for Fille en Aiguilles. The g is a hard g, like "guh". Does that make sense?

Not really, Blondex. In this case, it's 'gwee-yuh', the 'yuh' sound being hardly audible, although it's definitely there: it's not 'gwee'. It's not 'fee' either, it's 'fee-yuh' (same thing with the 'yuh' sound). But you don't have to struggle with a transcription: just go to Frag Name of the Day, look for Fille en Aiguilles in the Alphabetical List and listen to the sound file. :-)
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post #13 of 33
10/12/10 at 4:48pm
Thread Starter 
Thank you so much for the vote of confidence, everyone. It's much appreciated. I'm very glad you're enjoying the site and finding it useful.

And don't forget those requests. :-)
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post #14 of 33
10/12/10 at 4:58pm
Bela, I SO appreciate your correct and lovely to listen to pronunciations! (even though my midwestern US mouth is mangling even the semi-correct pronunciations ... they are so RIGHT in my mind but not out of my mouth!)

And I'm sorry MUA deleted you, that's ridiculous and shortsighted.

(My French professor, Jacques Butin, rolled his eyes at my attempts. If one can roll ones' eyes politely, that is... he did it. I gave up after one semester and went with the more literal, gutteral, German. :-) )
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post #15 of 33
10/12/10 at 5:18pm
The classic mispronounced fragrance is Anais Anais. Often given as Annay Annay, it is actually Ann-eye-ees Ann-eye-ees.

Or of course Infusion D'Iris by Prada. Correct pronunciation being Ahn-foo-zion deeh-riss.
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post #16 of 33
10/12/10 at 5:28pm
http://www.acapela-group.com/text-to...tive-demo.html
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post #17 of 33
10/12/10 at 5:41pm
I need not add the "Parfumz dee Orsay," for Parfums d'Orsay.

I even heard L'Instant called "La Instant."
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post #18 of 33
10/12/10 at 5:49pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by actiasluna View Post

Bela, I SO appreciate your correct and lovely to listen to pronunciations! (even though my midwestern US mouth is mangling even the semi-correct pronunciations ... they are so RIGHT in my mind but not out of my mouth!)

And I'm sorry MUA deleted you, that's ridiculous and shortsighted.

(My French professor, Jacques Butin, rolled his eyes at my attempts. If one can roll ones' eyes politely, that is... he did it. I gave up after one semester and went with the more literal, gutteral, German. :-) )

Thank you very much, Actiasluna. One of the rules on MUA is that you're not allowed to post the URL of any website you are affiliated to, even if it is useful to its members and you don't receive any monetary recompense from it. I was taking a risk, but I thought the post would just be deleted, not me. LOL! I must say I find it rather unfair considering how many MUA members expressed satisfaction with Frag Name of the Day, but what can I do?

It's a pity you didn't persevere with French, but I can understand it: it is quite disheartening when one doesn't succeed in something.
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post #19 of 33
10/12/10 at 5:51pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by HDS1963 View Post

The classic mispronounced fragrance is Anais Anais. Often given as Annay Annay, it is actually Ann-eye-ees Ann-eye-ees.

Or of course Infusion D'Iris by Prada. Correct pronunciation being Ahn-foo-zion deeh-riss.

Indeed, but, here again, no need to struggle with an approximate transcription (it can only be approximate without the use of phonetic symbols, especially when it comes to the nasal 'in'): I recorded those two names a while ago. :-)
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post #20 of 33
10/12/10 at 6:09pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by pluran View Post

http://www.acapela-group.com/text-to...tive-demo.html

Those kinds of websites can be useful, but they can never be 100% accurate because the words you hear are composed of small chunks of pre-recorded sound stuck together, so the stress and intonation are most often wrong and they can't cope with the pronunciation of words that are slightly out of the ordinary - like proper names for instance. They lack the human touch, or rather brain. LOL!

I tried it on Infusion d'Iris (1) and Serge Lutens (2):

1) with at least four of the five French voices on offer, the stress was in the wrong place, although, I must admit, the pronunciation of each syllable taken in isolation was correct.

2) their rendition of Lutens made me ROTFL. It was completely wrong.

I don't think I'm going to be out of a job any time soon.
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post #21 of 33
10/13/10 at 5:14am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Primrose View Post

Here is an old thread.

Just two days ago, a snooty SA looked down her nose and called "Estee Lauder" as "Es-tea Lauder." Hey, didn't she see the accent aigu over the first "e" at all?

http://www.basenotes.net/threads/227...ciation-Thread

Sorry I didn't answer you last night: my internet connection failed. I wasn't aware that Trufflehunter had recorded some names when I started doing (I'd said I would do this kind of thing back in 2002 when I first joined MUA so it was an old project of mine). I asked Trufflehunter whether he minded my doing it and he very kindly said no, he didn't have the time to carry on. If he had minded, I would have stopped doing it.

When I have a moment, I will go through that thread and add any name that is mentioned there and isn't yet on my list. Thank you for pointing it out to me.
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post #22 of 33
10/14/10 at 9:09am
even in french , there are some funny mistakes

Once a lady wanted to buy Arpège from Lanvin ...and she said " i want a bottle of Asperge de Lanvin "

Asperge means asparagus in french....
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post #23 of 33
10/14/10 at 9:23am
Thread Starter 
LOL! Thanks for that, Makassar.
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post #24 of 33
10/14/10 at 2:19pm
I love your site, Bela! You're doing us all such a favour, thank you! I always insert a link to your site when someone has a pronunciation question on our local perfume forum.

Request: would you please do Secretions Magnifiques? SM reviews are pretty hot right now on youtube, but nobody seems to pronounce it correctly
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post #25 of 33
10/14/10 at 2:47pm
saek kre sio man ni feek. Its tough to do phonetically saek pron. sake. I didnt the the liquor pronounciation. I hope that works for you. Geez germans a lot easier.
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post #26 of 33
10/14/10 at 7:27pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by makassar View Post

even in french , there are some funny mistakes

once a lady wanted to buy arpège from lanvin ...and she said " i want a bottle of asperge de lanvin "

asperge means asparagus in french....

rotfl!
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post #27 of 33
10/15/10 at 5:10am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Augusta View Post

I love your site, Bela! You're doing us all such a favour, thank you! I always insert a link to your site when someone has a pronunciation question on our local perfume forum.

Request: would you please do Secretions Magnifiques? SM reviews are pretty hot right now on youtube, but nobody seems to pronounce it correctly

Thank you so much, Augusta. I'm really touched. :-)

I am adding Sécrétions Magnifiques to my list.
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post #28 of 33
10/15/10 at 5:19am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by trex57 View Post

saek kre sio man ni feek. Its tough to do phonetically saek pron. sake. I didnt the the liquor pronounciation. I hope that works for you. Geez germans a lot easier.

Not bad at all, trex, but the two 'é's in Sécrétions are pronounced in exactly the same way and, since the 'é' sound doesn't exist in English, it's not possible to transcribe it accurately without a phonetic symbol, so I would encourage people to listen to sound files rather than relying on approximate transcriptions.
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post #29 of 33
10/15/10 at 5:33pm
Thank you, Bela, for the help. It's nice to see the list of pronunciations getting longer!
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post #30 of 33
10/16/10 at 1:28pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bela View Post

Not bad at all, trex, but the two 'é's in Sécrétions are pronounced in exactly the same way and, since the 'é' sound doesn't exist in English, it's not possible to transcribe it accurately without a phonetic symbol, so I would encourage people to listen to sound files rather than relying on approximate transcriptions.

Bela, thank you for your help. I am bilingual in french but the ability to print what you say phonetically escapes me as you saw.A la prochaine.
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post #31 of 33
10/17/10 at 5:27am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by trex57 View Post

Bela, thank you for your help. I am bilingual in french but the ability to print what you say phonetically escapes me as you saw.A la prochaine.

You're welcome, trex. It's hardly ever possible to transcribe anything with just letters of the alphabet and not everyone is familiar with phonetic symbols so it's not you...
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post #32 of 33
10/17/10 at 9:46am
Hi Bela!
Thank you for all your work on this.
I can't get the links for Idole and Lubin to work. I've wanted to know these forever and put them in an earlier request of mine.
Can you check those please?
RM
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post #33 of 33
10/17/10 at 10:50am
Thread Starter 
Thanks very much, Renaissance Man. Posterous is very annoying sometimes: it adds codes that mess up the links. I will see to it anon. :-)

Update: Idole worked fine for me. I have corrected the link for Lubin. It should be working now.
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