It's partly that many of the distinctive characteristics of an accent aren't reproduced well when you sing. Vowel sounds get stretched, and the precise articulation of the consonants is lost. The result is a neutral baseline accent that sounds vaguely American.
For many accents, the tune and the rhythm of a song can constrain these qualities to the point where the accent seemingly disappears. This is true even for certain qualities of the General American accent and regional American accents related to it.
In singing, syllables are lengthened, air flow is increased, articulation is less precise. Thus we get a more generic, neutralised accent that happens to share features with American varieties of English. Socially, there is an expectation (based on musical history) that popular music will be sung this way.
One of the more likely reasons that singers mimic American accents when they perform is that many are taught to do so by their vocal teachers to encourage good vowel techniques. These long, neutral vowel techniques can often sound more like an American accent, and British vocal hints will be lost in the song.
That's partially because of the way we round off certain words when we sing, and partially because the world is so used to hearing American accents in pop songs, it requires more effort and concentration to sing in a different accent. Even if that "different accent" is your default speaking voice.
It's partly that many of the distinctive characteristics of an accent aren't reproduced well when you sing. Vowel sounds get stretched, and the precise articulation of the consonants is lost. The result is a neutral baseline accent that sounds vaguely American.
Linguist Peter Trudgill tracked rhoticity in British rock music over the years and found that the Beatles' pronunciation of Rs decreased over the course of the 1960s, settling into a trans-Atlantic sound that incorporated aspects of both British and American dialects.
The “American English” we know and use today in an American accent first started out as an “England English” accent. According to a linguist at the Smithsonian, Americans began putting their own spin on English pronunciations just one generation after the colonists started arriving in the New World.
Because English is a language with far greater prestige, much more widely understood and spoken around the world. Bands want to make money off their music, and the more people you can reach, the more potential fans you'll get.
Invasions and migration have to a great extent been a driving force in the development of dialects and accents in Britain. In the fifth century, Germanic tribes from the northwest of the European continent began settling on the island.
Apparently, it is harder to fully pronounce certain words in a non-native accent, for instance, while singing. In singing, some syllables and vowels naturally get stressed to go with the cadence, rhythm, and melody of the music. As a result, some singers tend to naturally drop the accent without even realizing it.
Accents develop and change over time as people tend to live and communicate in specific and delineated communities. Accent is the social marker that signals either affiliation with a group or distance from a group.
It will take time and lots of practice. The good news is, it's possible! Recognize the sounds that give you the most trouble and focus on practicing them. It will take a while for your muscles to get used to it, but once they do, people might even start mistaking you for a native speaker!
Accents are a fluid feature of speech. If someone moves from Australia to the US to work, for example, they will probably at least modify their accent, either consciously or unconsciously. This may be out of a need or desire to be more clearly understood and to be accepted in a new community.
Everyone has an accent. Some people may argue this, but hear me out. Simply put, an accent is the particular way your voice sounds when you speak.
Not everyone sings with their natural talking voice – some people may put on an accent or imitate popular artists when they sing. But you can learn to sing with your talking voice and doing this will unlock your natural singing voice. There are lots of benefits to singing in your talking voice.
Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is speech disorder that causes a sudden change to speech so that a native speaker is perceived to speak with a “foreign” accent. FAS is most often caused by damage to the brain caused by a stroke or traumatic brain injury.
That nasally sound harkens back to the origins of country music. Most country singers who started out many years ago had totally untrained voices so the nasal sound was part of it, as was the yodeling type effects. It's a highly identifiable sound.
Singing gives you ready-made vocabulary, grammar, and full phrases. Memorizing songs when you have fun singing them helps keep vocabulary words and whole phrases ready to roll out of your mouth when a real-life opportunity presents itself. Singing foreign songs sharpens your listening skills.
Australian English arose from a dialectal melting pot created by the intermingling of early settlers who were from a variety of dialectal regions of Great Britain and Ireland, though its most significant influences were the dialects of Southeast England.
1788: The Australian accent, at least according to modern experts, began developing right after the arrival of European settlers and convicts.
Generally speaking though, it can be said that the Welsh accent is probably closest to an Australian one. This is due to their similarities in terms of pronunciation and vocabulary choices – both Welsh and Australians tend to end words on a 'v' sound rather than an 'r' sound like other English speakers do.
Take Adele. She grew up in Tottenham, London, and her speaking voice is distinctively British. Many people say it's a Cockney accent, though she isn't technically from the area associated with that way of speaking. If you hear her sing, though, you'd be hard-pressed to guess where she's from.
Many British people find it easier to sing British-American instead of British like Amy Winehouse and Adele who all adopted British-American accents to make it easier for the audience to connect and understand them.