How to pronounce the word 'balmy'?

English as a Second Language Listening, speaking, pronunciation and accent
1

Hi,

How do you pronounce “balmy”, with an “l” or without?

According to the dictionary it is without an “l”, but I just heard it pronounced with an “l”. I looked it up again and listened to the American pronunciation and there was an “l”.
thefreedictionary.com/balmy
A curious fact.

2

Hi OTS,

I listened to your reference and heard no ‘l’. To me it is pronounced the same as ‘barmy’, which is a bit strange because although ‘barmy’ means slightly crazy, ‘balmy’ means pleasantly warm. You could say that the situation is slightly barmy!

Alan

3

Hi Alan,

Thanks for replying!
In point of fact, there are two American versions presented in that reference: in one version a lady pronounces the word and in the other - a gentelman.
Did you listen to the lady’s version or thr gentelman’s?
When I listen to the genteman’s version, I think I hear a faint “r” too.

Then again, my listening abilities may be failing me, because I don’t have a good ear for accents. Hehe.

4

Hi OTS,

Could only get the man’s recording.

A

5

Hi Alan,

You need to click a small US flag on the left. Here’s a snapshot, please, follow the arrow:

I’m curious to know if there’s actually an “l” in that woman’s recording or it’s just me hearing it wrong.
[photo]1459[/photo]

Thanks again!

6

I don’t hear an ‘l’, though she does seem to cut the ‘a’ sound exceedingly short (even for an American accent).

7

Thanks Bev!
I have to concede that I was wrong about hearing that “l”. It’s not there.

8

Hi OTS,

Well, it must be me going barmy because I can’t hear an ‘l’ or a short ‘a’.

Alan

9

When investigating this topic I came across this article, which made me a little mad: deimel.org/language/l.htm

10

I don’t know why it would make you mad :))
By the way, I’d like to know your opinion on this subject too, if you care to weigh in :)))
I’m a little challenged pronunciation-wise, so sometimes I hear sounds that aren’t there, sometimes I don’t hear sounds that are there, which sometimes drives me up the wall Hehe, just kidding (about the wall).

11

Ops, sorry, when I first wrote my reply I didn’t see your recording (it sometimes shows up later apparently )

Thanks for your audio reply, now I see that in the US the “l” is not silent.
Nice to know I’m not losing my mind yet (because I definitely heard an “l”, like you)
Hehe

12

Hi T. J., do you really pronounce the ‘l’ in ‘calm’?[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC short conversations: Contract revisions[YSaerTTEW443543]

13

Hi there!

This is Michelle. Last night I was watching a cooking challenge show. The contestants were in Alaska and had cook salmon. They said the word salmon about 600 times. It reminded me of this discussion about how to pronounce balmy. I was thinking about the words that T.J. recorded. I’ve come up with what I think are the best rules/patterns for American English. Here are some examples from T.J.'s recording:

talk
walk
chalk

  • the ‘l’ is silent when the final sound is a ‘k’

should
could
would

-the ‘l’ is silent when the final sound is a ‘d’

calf
half

-the ‘l’ is silent when the final sound is an ‘f’

the ‘m’ and ‘n’ are both nasals, but only one has a silent ‘l’

calm
balm
palm

  • the ‘l’ sound is pronounced, but not very hard when the final sound is an ‘m’

Lincoln
colonel

-the ‘l’ sound is silent when the next sound is an ‘n’

There are of course variants, but it seems these rules/patterns can work the majority of the time and mostly in final sounds.

Michelle

14

I am not sure I pronounce it, but it definitely changes my pronunciation.

15

Interesting!
I guess we can conclude that in AmE the “l” is slightly voiced and in BrE it’s silent.
Looks like I’ve uncovered something big here.

Also I find it astonishing that our British speakers (Alan and Bev) could not hear the “l” in the American pronunciation of this word. I just can’t explain it. I guess it can be chalked up to a force of habit.

16

An update:
I asked Rachel (from www.RachelsEnglish.com ) this question and she confirmed that she puts the L in too.
She also gave me this reference where the L is included in the AmE transcription: oxforddictionaries.com/definitio … my?q=balmy