S0076 : French Speechdat(II) FDB-5000

The French SpeechDat(II) FDB-5000 database contains the recordings of 5,040 French speakers (2,693 females, 2,347 males) recorded over the French fixed telephone network. 40 speakers have been added to the original 5,000 speakers to fit the requirements of the database. This database is partitioned into 18 CDs, which comprise 300 speakers sessions each (except for CD 4, with 100 speakers sessions).

Speech samples are stored as sequences of 8-bit, 8kHz A-law and are not compressed. They contain a file header of 16 bytes. Each prompt utterance is stored within a separate file (file extension FRA) and has an accompanying ASCII SAM label file (file extension FRO).

This speech database was validated by SPEX (the Netherlands) to assess its compliance with the SpeechDat format and content specifications.

Each speaker uttered the following items:

• 5 application words
• 1 sequence of 10 isolated digits
• 4 connected digits (1 sheet number -5+ digits, 1 telephone number –9/11 digits, 1 credit card number –14/16 digits, 1 PIN code -6 digits)
• 3 dates (1 spontaneous date e.g. birthday, 1 word style prompted date, 1 relative and general date expression)
• 2 word spotting phrases using an embedded application word
• 1 isolated digit
• 3 spelled words (1 spontaneous e.g. own forename, 1 spelling of directory assistance city name, 1 real/artificial name for coverage)
• 1 currency money amount
• 1 natural number
• 5 directory assistance names and 1 spelled name (1 spontaneous e.g. own forename, 1 city of birth/hometown, 1 most frequent city out of a set of 500, 1 most frequent company/agency out of a set of 500, 1 "forename surname", 1 spelled-out city of birth)
• 2 yes/no questions (1 predominantly "yes" question, 1 predominantly "no" question)
• 9 phonetically rich sentences
• 2 time phrases (1 spontaneous time of day, 1 word style time phrase)
• 8 phonetically rich words.

The following age distribution has been obtained: 215 speakers are under 16, 2531 speakers are between 16 and 30, 1208 speakers are between 31 and 45, 910 speakers are between 46 and 60, and 176 speakers are over 60.

A pronunciation lexicon with a phonemic transcription in SAMPA is also included.