TTSBOX: a MATLAB toolbox for teaching text-to-speech synthesis

This paper presents a new toolbox for teaching TTS synthesis. TTSBOX performs the synthesis of Genglish (for "generic English"), an imaginary language obtained by replacing English words by generic words. Genglish therefore has a rather limited lexicon, but its pronunciation maintains most of the problems encountered in natural languages. TTSBOX uses simple data-driven techniques (bigrams, CARTs, NUUs) while trying to keep the code minimal, so as to keep it readable for students with reasonable MATLAB practice. TTSBOX was designed with the hope that it can help to increase the personal involvement of undergraduate and graduate students in their TTS courses.