Just watch Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons. You will have a realistic Russian accent down in no time.
I have a Czech acquaintance who grew up under Communism - it annoys him to no end when people assume from his accent that he’s Russian.
Rules for achieving a mediocre or better Christopher Walken impression:
1: Let’s begin with the difficult one: the New York accent.
2: Always pronounce one syllable words using two syllables
3: You have to pause... occasionally... within sentences. But not too often or it becomes repetitive.
4: You have to draw out the final word of a sentence occasionally. But not too often or it becomes repetitive.
5: You have to crack your voice occasionally. What do I mean by that? Hard to explain without demonstrating. But again, not too often or it becomes repetitive.
6: Sound a little bit crazy. Do this often.
Also Russian doesn’t have the verb to be in the present tense. So you can drop an ‘am, is or are’ every now and then. “I very important man” “She very pretty voman”
Russian accent eez sexy. But Russian men always seem dour and depressed.
(Sometimes that’s sexy, too.)
I’m a native-born (Anglo) American, but I have a degree in Russian. Mostly because of that, I already have a really good Russian accent when speaking English, should I so desire. I’ve also been mistaken as a native Russian speaker by native Russians—because I’ve been continuously (every day) perfecting my Russian accent (when speaking Russian) since I began learning the language in 1971 (age 14.)
Russian does not have the word “the,” nor the word “a.” So don’t use use either of those words when attempting to sound like a Russian when speaking English.
Also, when using the present tense, they almost never use any form of the verb “to be” (they do have the words, they just rarely use them.) So, instead of “I am ready,” they will say, “I ready.” (Not that all of them will make such mistakes when speaking English, some of them can be VERY hard to distinguish from native speakers of English.)
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Moose and skwirrel.
I am practicing to call Adam SCIF and spoof him into thinking I have nekked peekchurs of Trrump.
Interestink...
Firstly, there IS an “I” sound in the Russian language.
Secondly, there IS an “I” sound in the Russian language....as in “Eye”
For example...Ya Nye Zn-Eye-Yoo....ie: “ I don’t know”
OR! Eg Mik-EYE-al.....as in Mikhail Baryshnikov
My friend in BiH always told me to speak Croatian with an American accent “because when you speak Croatian you sound like a demented Russian.”
I wonder if I spoke Russian in Russia, I would be told I sound like a demented Croatian.
Cool Russian accent tips.