Exception: [!] No espeak backend found. Install espeak-ng or espeak to your system.

[pnowakowski614]

Hi, I'm trying to synthesize speech on Windows 10 using blizzard2013/capacitron-t2-c50 tts model and blizzard2013/hifigan as a vocoder. I've installed espeak-ng (https://github.com/espeak-ng/espeak-ng/blob/master/docs/guide.md) but I still keep getting traceback as follows:

  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\runpy.py", line 194, in _run_module_as_main
    return _run_code(code, main_globals, None,
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\runpy.py", line 87, in _run_code
    exec(code, run_globals)
  File "C:\Users\Piotrek\anaconda3\Scripts\tts.exe\__main__.py", line 7, in <module>
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\bin\synthesize.py", line 309, in main
    synthesizer = Synthesizer(
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\utils\synthesizer.py", line 76, in __init__
    self._load_tts(tts_checkpoint, tts_config_path, use_cuda)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\utils\synthesizer.py", line 113, in _load_tts
    self.tts_model = setup_tts_model(config=self.tts_config)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\tts\models\__init__.py", line 13, in setup_model
    model = MyModel.init_from_config(config, samples)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\tts\models\tacotron2.py", line 432, in init_from_config
    tokenizer, new_config = TTSTokenizer.init_from_config(config)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\tts\utils\text\tokenizer.py", line 188, in init_from_config
    phonemizer = get_phonemizer_by_name(config.phonemizer, **phonemizer_kwargs)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\tts\utils\text\phonemizers\__init__.py", line 42, in get_phonemizer_by_name
    return ESpeak(**kwargs)
  File "c:\users\piotrek\anaconda3\lib\site-packages\TTS\tts\utils\text\phonemizers\espeak_wrapper.py", line 91, in __init__
    raise Exception(" [!] No espeak backend found. Install espeak-ng or espeak to your system.")
Exception:  [!] No espeak backend found. Install espeak-ng or espeak to your system.

What may be the cause of this problem?

[p0p4k]

What does 'espeak-ng hello' in command prompt return?

[Anomyous1]

pip install python-espeak-ng
Collecting python-espeak-ng
  Using cached python-espeak-ng-0.6.6.tar.gz (9.1 kB)
Using legacy 'setup.py install' for python-espeak-ng, since package 'wheel' is not installed.
Installing collected packages: python-espeak-ng
    Running setup.py install for python-espeak-ng ... error
    ERROR: Command errored out with exit status 1:

    .............

    espeakmodulecore.cpp
    espeak/espeakmodulecore.cpp(24): fatal error C1083: Cannot open include file: 'espeak-ng/speak_lib.h': No such file or directory
    error: command 'C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Visual Studio\\2019\\Community\\VC\\Tools\\MSVC\\14.29.30133\\bin\\HostX86\\x64\\cl.exe' failed with exit code 2
    ----------------------------------------
ERROR: Command errored out with exit status 1: 'C:\\tts\venv_tts\scripts\python.exe' -u -c 'import io, os, sys, setuptools, tokenize; sys.argv[0] = '"'"'C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\pip-install-bo598j__\\python-espeak-ng_ae4c6eb2567f4e35b2164b72b4cc309d\\setup.py'"'"'; __file__='"'"'C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\pip-install-bo598j__\\python-espeak-ng_ae4c6eb2567f4e35b2164b72b4cc309d\\setup.py'"'"';f = getattr(tokenize, '"'"'open'"'"', open)(__file__) if os.path.exists(__file__) else io.StringIO('"'"'from setuptools import setup; setup()'"'"');code = f.read().replace('"'"'\r\n'"'"', '"'"'\n'"'"');f.close();exec(compile(code, __file__, '"'"'exec'"'"'))' install --record 'C:\Users\User\AppData\Local\Temp\pip-record-d_dreko0\install-record.txt' --single-version-externally-managed --compile --install-headers 'C:\\tts\venv_tts\include\site\python3.9\python-espeak-ng' Check the logs for full command output.

[SophieDC98]

I ran !sudo apt-get install espeak in my Colab, restarted the runtime and everything is working fine now

[Corey4005]

If you see the code it tries to find espeak or espeak-ng in your system using python's which util. You can probably try the following code in your current TTS environment to confirm if espeak is installed correctly, if not, you can try a fresh installation:

from shutil import which
print(which('espeak'))
print(which('espeak-ng'))

This was actually my problem. I needed to download espeak using the msi for windows. Then, I added espeak-ng to my PATH variable and the code worked!

[fahnub]

@sophieDataroots solution worked for me.

[pepetikesavasiddhardha]

Yeah this is helping me thanks

[erdemkaymaz]

you can try brew install espeak, worked for me.

[FieldMarshallVague]

I get this same issue on windows. I installed the espeak windows version using MSI installed and added install folder to path, but it looks like it doesn't see it, or more likely isn't looking for that install (the 'espeak-ng/speak_lib.h' header file isn't in that folder anyway, looks like it comes from a build package).

[FieldMarshallVague]

Ah, I misunderstood. You actually have to run the EXE in the background, it's not being called from TTS.

So, you need to run the espeak.exe in background to run the ljs models.

e.g. Start-Process -FilePath "C:\Program Files\eSpeak NG\espeak-ng.exe" (in powershell for windows)

[liuyiyuan]

I met the same question in wins 11 sys;
I use cmd fix it;
"pip install python-espeak-ng"

[MissingTwins]

For colab

!apt update && apt install espeak 
!pip install espeakng 
# restart session
from shutil import which
print(which('espeak'))
print(which('espeak-ng'))

[Fatiprogramist]

same problem. what is solution for windows?

[stearno]

the pip install did not solve for me.

What fixed for me was put this at top of my code:
import os

os.environ["PATH"] = r"C:\Program Files\eSpeak NG;" + os.environ["PATH"]