The Effect of the Spoken Dialect on the Singing Dialect: The Example of Lithuanian

Background in ethnomusicology. It is widely known that dialects of the vocal tradition differ not only in the traits of their musical structures but also in the vocal techniques, articulation, etc. In part, our earlier studies have shown that there are certain dialectal differences between the vocal techniques of northeast and southern Lithuanian (Ambrazevičius, 2001, 2002). Background in phonetics. Obviously, spoken dialects differ to a greater or lesser extent in their phonetics, lexis and other aspects. For example, numerous studies show that all Lithuanian dialects have particular features. Southern and Eastern Aukštaitian (Southern and Northeast Lithuanian) are similar in different levels of the language. Nevertheless, these dialects differ in the acoustics of the vowels (spectrum, intensity, and pitch) (Leskauskaitė, 2004; Urbanavičienė, 2003, 2004). Aims. We aim to clarify the possible influences of the spoken dialect on the sung dialect. Hypothetically, the acoustics of speech does not merely affect the phonetics of singing, but also the vocal technique and other traits of singing. Main contribution. Samples of the speech of eight speakers (three from Northeast Lithuania and five from Southern Lithuania) were analyzed. SPLs, F1 and F2 of vowels were measured