These are sound examples for Patel, A.D. & Iversen, J.R. (2003). Acoustic and perceptual
comparison of speech and drum sounds in the North Indian Tabla
tradition: An empirical study of sound symbolism. Proceedings of the 15th
International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 3-9 August 2003,
The tools, below, for playing these samples are Java applets. Most machines are already configured to run Java applets, but if the applets don't work, you will need to install Java (note: Windows XP, by default, does not include Java). If you're not certain, start by visiting Sun's Java download page using the link below and downloading Java. If you already have it installed, you will be informed of this during installation and can cancel the installation process.
Note! Before listening to these sound examples, if you would like to do an experiment in which you try to match the spoken tabla syllables (bols) to their corresponding drum sounds, click here.
Here are the four contrast groups used in the study.
Ta vs. Dha:
Tin vs. Tun:
Kat vs. Ghe:
Tra vs. Kra:
Other tabla websites