The translated suttas have Pali words in them. Pali words are not spoken correctly by AWS Polly voices such as Raveena. To remedy this, we have words/en.json that helps sc-voice identify and speak Pali words using voice-specific IPA that is generated automatically.
To identify Pali words, we compare each word against all the English words ever used in translation by Bhante Sujato. That is almost 7,000 words. Any word that is not an English Bhante Sujato word is assumed to be Pali.
To speak Pali words, we generate the IPA for each word using words/voices.json, which has regular expressions used to replace a Pali word with corresponding IPA symbols. When spoken, Pali words are accompanied by very short pauses to denote the Pali language transition. These pauses are required for AWS Polly and create an intelligible, if choppy listening experience. The breaks are required because AWS Polly artificial intelligence understands something of English grammar and understands how to speak a sentence smoothly. This smoothness has to be chopped with breaks to speak a Pali word. What you will hear is smooth English with pauses for inserted Pali words.
Here, then is Raveena speaking the first part of MN1. I’ve included Amy for comparison. Looks like Amy is still in the running…
Raveena samples MN1
Amy samples MN1
Please listen for errors and inaccuracies. We are not trying to emulate the beautiful PaliAudio suttas here. Instead, our goal is to provide sutta excerpts for visual assistance. For this, our metric is intelligibility of content and accuracy of pronunciation.
For the curious, here are the spoken segments that are sent piecemeal to AWS Polly:
{ segments:
[ '<break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="maʝ.ʝhɪma">Majjhima</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="nɪkɑja">Nikāya</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> 1 <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="mʊːlɐpɐɺɪjɑjɐˌsuθθä">Mūlapariyāyasutta</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/>.',
'\n',
'So I have heard.',
'At one time the <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="buddʰa">Buddha</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> was staying near <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="uk.kɐʈ̆ʈʰɑ">Ukkaṭṭhā</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/>, in the <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="subʰɐga">Subhaga</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> Forest at the root of a magnificent <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="sɐl">sal</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> tree.',
'There the <break time="0.001s"/><phoneme alphabet="ipa" ph="buddʰa">Buddha</phoneme><break time="0.001s"/> addressed the mendicants : “Mendicants!',
'” “Venerable sir,” they replied.',
'\n',
'“Mendicants, I will teach you the explanation of the root of all things.',
'Listen and pay close attention, I will speak.',
'” “Yes, sir,” they replied.',
'\n',
'“Take an uneducated ordinary person who has not seen the noble ones, and is neither skilled nor trained in their teaching.',
'They’ve not seen good persons, and are neither skilled nor trained in their teaching.',
'They perceive earth as earth.',
'But then they conceive earth, they conceive regarding earth, they conceive as earth, they conceive that ‘earth is mine’, they take pleasure in earth.',
'Why is that?',
'Because they haven’t completely understood it, I say.',
'\n',
'They perceive water as water.',
'But then they conceive water… Why is that?',
'Because they haven’t completely understood it, I say.',
'\n',
'They perceive fire as fire.',
'But then they conceive fire… Why is that?',
'Because they haven’t completely understood it, I say.' ],
Well done 
oh dear. Soundcloud ran the clips together. It’s Raveena’s greatest hits. 