:Rise-fall:

The name of a nuclear tone in many analyses of English intonation. The pitch characteristics differ depending on the presence of absence of tail syllables:

  1. when there are no tail syllables the contour starts at mid pitch or below, rises rapidly to high and then falls to low
  2. when the nucleus is followed by tail syllables the contour starts at mid pitch or below, rises to high by the syllable following the nucleus and then falls to low and remains low until the end of the intonation phrase


Fundamental frequency contour for a high fall.