One question that I am always emailed from customers is “how do you trill the double ‘r’ in Spanish?”
Until now my response has not been too helpful. I usually respond by saying something like “flap your tongue on the roof of your mouth two or three times” or some other advice that I found in a learning-Spanish book that really wasn’t too much help.
So I decided to ask some native Spanish instructors who I know to give me some advice that I could pass along to the LSLC students and readers.
And to my surprise, I found that some native Spanish speakers have trouble pronouncing the “rr” as a child. That is somewhat assuring.
How To Trill The Double “R” In Spanish?
A good friend of mine — se llama Juan Carlos — told me that, like most native Spanish-speaking children, he did NOT have a problem learning how to pronounce the double rr. He was able to easily pronounce it at the age of 3. But he told me that his brother did not learn how to pronounce the double “rr” in Spanish until the age of 8.
So I asked him were there any special exercises or techniques that his brother had to do in order to learn how to pronounce the double rr in Spanish.
And he told me “sí.” His brother had to practice a “trabalenguas” (tongue twister).
So if you are having trouble trilling the rr in Spanish, here’s a fun “trabalenguas” (tongue twister), that you may want to try on your own.
Try saying this at a normal speed. As you get better at it trying saying it faster and faster.
Erre con erre guitarra, erre con erre barril, mira qué rapido ruedan las ruedas del ferrocarril
By the way, you may want to practice this exercise in the privacy of your own home. If you walk down the street saying this “trabalenguas” some people may think that you “se volvió loco” (went crazy) 🙂
