Hurston-1: Open-Source Accented English NB-TTS for Phone
Summary
Hurston-1 is an open-source TTS model focused on accented English (Southern American and Afro-English), built as a narrowband phone-friendly variant. It fine-tunes Maya1 and targets telephony use with both 8 kHz phone-quality output and standard 24 kHz audio, including detailed training data, evaluation, and licensing. The project emphasizes accessibility, accent diversity, and responsible use for testing, IVR, and education.