Why do singers lose their accent when they sing?

Why do singers lose their accent when they sing?

WHEN YOU LISTEN TO A SINGER WHO HAS A STRONG BRITISH ACCENT, LIKE ADELE, OFTEN IT IS LOST WHEN THEY SING OR SOME EVEN SOUND AMERICAN. WHY IS THIS?

This is such an interesting topic for me as I give lessons on skype across the world and work with people with lots of different accents. Each of these accents affects the voice differently, but we will get into that later. First of all to understand why the accent is lost we first must understand what makes up an accent.

Vowels - Vowels define an accent. Vowels are elongated in music. Singers use the vowels that are easiest and most resonant especially on high notes. Listen to Ben Platt singing the high notes of Waving Through a Window at 4.25. When we save an ‘i’ vowel it is normally quite short and closed. The rhythm of the songs means this vowel must be held and the melody it particularly high. He moves the ‘i’ vowel in the ‘ing’ of waving to wave- ah-ng to help him achieve those high notes. 

Melody and rhythm - Many accents rely on melody and rhythm to define them, especially sing-song accents like Welsh. The melody and rhythm of the song cancel out the melody and rhythm of speech. This does change when a song is written for an accent, for example, many types of folk and country singing come about from maintaining the natural rhythm and melody of an accent. In this clip of the Dixie Chicks, the verses follow a similar pattern to speech which allows the singer to use their natural placement of vowels and consonants. The rhotic General American ‘r’ is particularly prominent in country music and is lost in other types of music. 

Placement - To get a balanced and relaxed sound, especially over the break and high notes we need a neutral larynx and placement. It’s very interesting for me because the accent does matter when teaching lessons around the world as our singing voice is an extension of our speaking voice. Our natural placement. which is often defined by our accent, can aid and/or hinder our singing voice. Often the exercises I use to help people find a balanced tone over their break differ depending on where they are from. English accents tend to help people find a beautiful warm tone and light head voice, Americans accent tends to help people find a strong mix. Remember, you are exercising and training the muscles and shapes you make with your vocal tract daily just by speaking.

SO WHY DO PEOPLE GENERALLY SOUND AMERICAN?

American is often considered neutral. For decades, the neutral accent has become synonymous with or associated with the American accent. This is mostly due to TV and cinema. It’s very easy to differentiate the UK from US TV shows and movies because of the accent. In an American accent, words are pronounced in pretty much the same way they are spelled and this placement seems to benefit pop and rock singing. Having said that, the American Vowel shapes are not useful for all genres, Opera tends to lean towards open Italian vowels even when singing, even in English and in pop and rock people tend to drop the General American rhotic ‘r’. A rhotic ‘r’ is when speakers pronounce the letter r at the end of words like car and lover, while singers (apart from country singers) would go towards a more English sounding lovah, or risk sounding like a pirate.  Listen to Jackie Wilson sing Higher and Higher at 0.40.

Of course this isn’t always the case, there is one example for me which is a dead give away for a Southern English accent. Many English pop singers use an english ‘ah’ rather than an American/Scottish/Northern English ‘aa’. Listen to Ed Sheeran singing the word ‘can’t’ at 0.15.

I also find it interesting when I hear people sing ‘Happy Birthday’ as people generally sing it fully in their accent. My theory is this is because of the combination of vowels that vary across accents, think of the Scottish ‘you’ compared to an American ‘you’. It is also maybe one of the first songs we learn to sing when we are first learning to pronounce vowels. I certainly always revert back to a Scottish accent when singing this with family and friends. 

MUSIC THAT IS DEFINED BY ACCENT

Some styles of music are defined by the accent (Cockney songs, country, Scottish folk) and some people purposely keep their accent as their personal style (Kate Nash, The Proclaimers, Paulo Nutini). 

But no matter, what if you listen carefully there are generally always little markers of accent within the sung voice, even if it is very subtle. 

Link to full blog and links here: https://www.bethroars.com/singing-blog-tips/2020/1/23/why-do-singers-lose-there-accent-when-they-sing