Discover how to comfortably use and pronounce the idiom “Spill the Beans” in conversational English. Learn which words or syllables to reduce, how to link them together, and the melodic shape of the phrase.
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Video Transcript:
Today I’m going to go over the pronunciation for the idiom –to spill the beans–. This is what you say when someone reveals something that was supposed to be kept secret. For example, my mother’s birthday party was supposed to be a surprise, but my younger brother spilled the beans. Meaning, he accidentally told her about it.
–Spill– begins with the S consonant sound, ss pp, followed by the P sound. Both are unvoiced. Sp- sp-. Then the ‘ih’ as in ‘sit’ vowel sound [ɪ], spi-, spi-ll. The dark L sound where the tongue moves up into position, ihll, spill. –The– begins with the voiced TH sound [ð], th, th, tongue comes through the teeth to make that, the, with the schwa sound [ə]. Spill the-. –Beans– begins with the voiced consonant sound, bb, followed by the ‘ee’ as in ‘she’ vowel sound [i]. Bea-, bea-nn. Tongue moves up into position for the N, where the front part of the tongue touches the roof of the mouth, bean, nn, zz. And finally, the Z voiced consonant sound. Beans, beans, spill the beans. Spill and beans are both the stressed words in this phrase. Spill the beans.
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