Saturday, April 14, 2007

can anyone tell me..

...why the BBC's standard pronunciation for Manuel de Falla's surname is "de FAL-li-ya" rather than "de FI-ya"?
Radio 3 have been doing it all week and now Counterpoint on Radio 4 are doing it too. Although the contestant pronunced it "de FI-ya".

2 comments:

Helibear said...

Is it spanish?
My nan once told me that in some parts of Spain they pronounce LL as "ya" and in other parts is "lya"
So paella could be "pay-ey-a" or "pay-el-ya"
Does that make any sense at all?

Pig wot flies said...

Yes, he was born in Cadiz. I'm intrigued by the change. Perhaps the BBC pronunciation department has refined their knowledge of regional spanish pronunciation.