British Singers Sounding American? How And Why! [VIDEO]

Something I've always been curious about is why British singers can sound so American when they sing? What happened to the thick accent they use while speaking?

My confusion came shortly after watching the last Grammy Awards and even the Oscars when British pop sensation Adele gave her acceptance speech for the latest Bond theme song "Skyfall." Her strong accent almost smacks you in the face compared to her singing voice.

So why does Adele sound so American? Or why does the Australian blooded Country superstar Keith Urban have a Southern American accent? I looked into the topic and the simple answer for this is well... because it's popular and it's what other superstars have been doing for decades.

A big reason for British singers adoption of an American accent in their vocals goes all the way back to the 1960's and possibly earlier due to American Blues and Rock and Roll being an influence to British artists. The Rolling Stones and The Beatles are a prime example of this when they started recording in the 60's.

At a press conference for The Beatles in 1964, John Lennon was asked. "Why do you sing like Americans and talk like Englishmen?" And John replied by saying, "It sells better."

Musicians back in the day were hugely influenced by the African-American English vernacular. Singers began adopting many different American dialects which included adopting American vowel sounds as well as something called rhoticity, which is the pronunciation of r sounds where they appear in a word as opposed to the English habit of dropping the r sound at the end of a syllable.

A recent study on pop singers coming out of New Zealand showed that the American accent came by default, possibly because of today's singers being brought up by American music.

So, we have the awesome early American blues and rock and roll artist to thank for this. Otherwise today's hit music may have sounded slightly different. Could you imagine any of Adele's songs being belted out with a British accent? Neither can I.

[Slate]