How to pronounce Russian Words?

How to pronounce Russian words?

• I can write in Russian, but the words are very hard to pronounce. Is there a way, I can improve on pronouncing the words?

• Answer:

  Personally I think that it's important to get a special training (and a quality one, too) on pronunciation in the very beginning, because if you get it wrong, later it would be more difficult to re-teach yourself. Also it seems to me that live tutoring is better than computer programs. Computer drills are useful once you already know the 'technical' aspects of phonetics (like how to articulate the palatalised [n'] correctly). I would recommend to find a teacher or a reliable native speaker (better with a linguistics background) and get like 5 or 6 classes focusing on pronunciation (it includes also reading, of course, because some letters when spelled together produce different sounds). Then practice on your own with some online programs. And also get some follow-up classes with your tutor. You can also learn some poems or pieces of prose by heart repeating after a recorded native speaker. It can help you to master the intonation. BTW, the English pronunciation is also very hard to master ;)))