In unit selection text-to-speech approach, each unit is described by a set of parameters. However, which parameters effectively express prosody of speech is a problem. In this paper, we propose an approach to the determination of prosody parameters for unit selection-based speech synthesis. We are concerned about how prosody parameters can correctly describe tones and prosodic breaks in Chinese speech. First, we define and evaluate a set of parameters. Then, we cluster the parameters and select a representative parameter from each cluster. Finally, the parameters are evaluated in a real TTS system. Experiment shows that the selected parameters help to improve speech quality.
展开▼
