I'm not hearing any kind of slender sound in these two words. To my ear, the f in fear and the b in bean sound broad, not slender. Anyone else having that problem? Are they broad, or am I missing something?

With other words, I can hear a definite glide after a slender f or b, but not with fear and bean.

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Táim ag foghlaim fós. Fáilte roimh gach aon cheartúchán.

They aren't broad. Before -ear and -ean (and -ea- before most consonants), slender f and b are just "normal" f's and b's except you spread your lips as if you were smiling, when you pronounce them.
If you had broad ones (if it were "far" and "ban") you'd hear kind of a very short w sound after the consonant: "fwahr", "bwahn" and the a-sound would be "darker".



there aren't glides after all slender consonants, it depends on the following vowel-sound (which may depend on dialect, especially before ll, nn, m).
There are y-glides in beo, feoil, b'fhiú, fiú, (and in Munster, in beann, feall), sometimes in C and M in beá-, feá... But not in other cases (bea-, bi-, bé-...)
But in no living Irish dialect you'd have a y-glide in "fear" nor in "bean" as far as I know, it's always "fahr" and "bahn" (with a short ah-sound).

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

Go raibh maith agat, a Lughaidh.

By "normal" f and b, do you mean "English" f and b, because that's how I'm pronouncing them. (I'll have to work on the "smiling" part.

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Táim ag foghlaim fós. Fáilte roimh gach aon cheartúchán.

By normal f and b, I think it's as in English "fit" and "bit", these are quite close to slender Irish f and b, I think (or maybe it's because I do slender consonants when I speak English? lol)

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

I mostly agree with what Lughaidh has said except for this bit:


The first part about the y-glide is correct.

The part of it I would like to comment on is the "it's always "fahr" and "bahn" (with a short ah-sound)."

In Connemara, at least, the vowel in both fear and bean is /æ:/, like the a in English "man".

The /æ/ vowel is a middle vowel. This may be another reason the glides aren't as clear as if you had a slender consonant with a back vowel or a broad consonant with a front vowel.

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

Ah yeah I forgot that about Connemara vowels, all stressed a's are long in Connemara :-)

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne