Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

xylophone

UK /ˈzaɪ.ləˌfəʊn/ · US /ˈzaɪləˌfoʊn/ noun, verb

Forms xylophones xylophoning xylophoned

  1. noun (music) Any musical instrument (percussion idiophone) made of wooden slats graduated so as to make the sounds of the scale when struck with a small drumstick-like mallet; the standard Western concert xylophone or one of its derivatives. “All I know how to play on my xylophone is "Mary Had a Little Lamb". Would you like to hear it?”
  2. verb To play a xylophone or to play something else as though it was a xylophone.
  3. verb To move above a ridged surface or series of surfaces so as to hit every ridge, in a manner similar to playing quickly and sequentially on a xylophone.

Synonyms

marimba

Etymology

From xylo- (“of wood”) + -phone (“sound”).

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun An instrument common among the Russians, Poles, and Tartars, consisting of a series of strips of wood or glass graduated in length to the musical scale, resting on belts of straw, and struck with two small hammers. Called in Germany strohfiedel, or straw fiddle.
  2. noun An instrument to determine the vibrative properties of different kinds of wood. Knight.

Etymology [Xylo- + Gr. fwnh` sound.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “xylophone”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details