Why do British singers lose their accent when they sing?

GuilewasNK

GuilewasNK

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I've been listening to Estelle lately and it got me thinking...

Every Bristish singer I have heard sings with an "american" accent. Why is that?
 
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The singer from Maximo Park keeps his accent. I don't know if it is something they control or if it just happens.
 
[quote name='Rocko']Yeah, you never hear a British accent in songs.[/quote]

What about Dexter's Midnight Runners...That song "Come On Eileen" has a thick Cockney accent

[MEDIA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7z9bPrUark4[/MEDIA]


By the way, where is the media tag button? I don't see it. I had to type out the media tags myself...
 
A lot of foreign singers are probably inspired by American music and developed their craft singing along to it. Accents can be funny. If you are born in the upper United States and movie to the south as an adult you can still develop a southern accent. I have an aunt who moved to the south and within a few years she had a twang to her speech.
 
Yes to what Crunchb3rry says. Also, IIRC, Singing and Speaking are learned in different parts of the brain.

I'll do you one better... my boss at my last job was a Filipino with a thick accent, hard to understand unless you spend a lot of time around him. Give him a guitar, though, and he can do a perfect imitation of Jim Croce.
 
[quote name='camoor']

But yeah, it's not surprising most British acts lose their accents in the quest to be more commercial.[/quote]

That, or it could be that when learning to sing you sometimes impersonate other singers. I once met a Korean singer who had a thick Korean accent but a beautiful opera like singing voice. Of course, opera is a but more structured than rock, but still.
 
I think it may be a more conscious choice, some acts like The Clash seem to purposefully keep their accents, while other acts like The Beatles don't. Maybe it has to do with being more pop like vs more punk like, wanting to sound like a please all act vs an edgier more real act.
 
[quote name='GTzerO']That, or it could be that when learning to sing you sometimes impersonate other singers. I once met a Korean singer who had a thick Korean accent but a beautiful opera like singing voice. Of course, opera is a but more structured than rock, but still.[/quote]


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Figalo Figalo Fiiiiiiigalllllo!
 
[quote name='Maklershed']I've noticed this myself. And I've conversely wondered, why does Billy Joe Armstrong of Green Day fame gain a British accent.[/quote]

I better not be the only one who laughed at this.
 
[quote name='TC']What about Madonna? :D[/quote]


I can't firgure her out. I can understand picking up some dialects while living around different groups of people and even speaking in a somewhat similar fashion, but to adopt an entirely new accent is crazy.

I knew a guy in junior high that did that though. His mother was from England and his father from the US. He always spoke with an american accent and one day he just decided to use a British one.

Also, that reminds me of Gillian Anderson from X-Files. When she does interviews in the US she uses an american accent and when she does them in the UK she uses a British one. I think she originally hails fromt he UK though, unlike Madonna.
 
[quote name='GuilewasNK']I can't firgure her out. I can understand picking up some dialects while living around different groups of people and even speaking in a somewhat similar fashion, but to adopt an entirely new accent is crazy.

I knew a guy in junior high that did that though. His mother was from England and his father from the US. He always spoke with an american accent and one day he just decided to use a British one.

Also, that reminds me of Gillian Anderson from X-Files. When she does interviews in the US she uses an american accent and when she does them in the UK she uses a British one. I think she originally hails fromt he UK though, unlike Madonna.[/quote]Nope, she's from Illinois.
 
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