I need to learn how to pronounce 'swan song' (a painting by Sarluis).
I believe the french phrase is 'chanson de cygne' and I despair of
ever being able to wrap my untrained tongue around it -- but I'd like
to get as close as possible.

Dear onymous,

The best and most common way to translate the term "swan song" into
French is "le chant du cygne" (if using the phrase in English context,
you can omit the 'le'-article at the beginning).

Here is how to pronounce it:

le = lu, with the "u" pronounced like in "turn", but short.

chant = shaun, with the "a" pronounced like the British do in
"dancing". The "n" at the end is very (!) soft.

du = this one is not easy. If you know how to pronounce a German
"ü"-Umlaut, it would be "dü". Unfortunately, that sound is not known
in the English language. For a usable substitute, pronounce it "de"
(with short e, not like 'dee').

cygne = seen-yuh, with the "yuh"-part being short, soft and almost
swallowed by the speaker.

So, pronounce the whole term "le chant du cygne" like this: "lu shaun
de seen-yuh".

I hope this was helpful!
Best regards,
Scriptor

Hi,

"chanson de cygne" is pronounced like in the file below:
http://membres.lycos.fr/endo/GA.mp3

Thanks.
endo

It appears that onymous-ga is referring to this painting:

"Leonard Sarluis - 'Chanson de Cygne'"
Papillon Gallery
http://www.papillongallery.com/sarluis.html

With my years of high school French, I would say "chanson" is
pronounced close to "shan saw", while "de" sounds somewhere in between
"di" (with a short "i" as in "big") and "duh" (with a short "u" as in
"bug").  If this is confusing, perhaps someone else can explain it
better.

Sorry that address should be:

http://membres.lycos.fr/dbky/endo/GA.mp3

Sorry for any confusion.
Regards,
endo

I'll amend my pronunciation of "chanson" slightly: it's a bit more
like "shahn saw", where "shahn" rhymes with "swan" (appropriately
enough).

I missed the opportunity to thank scriptor-ga when I rated the answer.
Thank you. Also, I appreciate all the helpful comments.  The .mp3 file
was especially great.