On Cecil's comments about singers' accents.

[Hari_Seldon]

In today’s column, Why don’t British singers sound British when they sing? - The Straight Dope, I would like to correct Cecil on one minor point. Americans don’t say “liddle” for “little”. If there were a word “liddle”, it would differ, not in the consonant, but in the length of the first vowel. Two clearer examples are “rider” vs. “writer” and “ladder” vs. “latter”. Which is striking because vowel length is almost never a distinguishing feature in English. The consonant in each case is a tap of the roof of the mouth, or a near tap, with the tongue.

A propos his main point, I was once (probably around 1980) in a cafe in Strassbourg with a German friend when a pair came in and started singing American rock in a perfect American accent. I remarked on this and my friend claimed that they might not even speak English, but had learned to imitate American rockers. I was not able to confirm this.

[kk_fusion]

I think he is saying that Americans pronounce little like a British speaker would say liddle.

On the other hand, I think most British wouldn’t articulate a t between two short vowels either. They just make a glottal stop: li’l.

To my ears, the d/t-distinction is well preserved in Irish dialects.

[Little_Brother_1]

This anecdotal comment is a far cry from the nuanced linguistic analysis in the piece, but FWIW…

Based on my own experience as a thoroughly amateur singer/guitar strummer, my sense is that this phenomenon is generally a matter of unconscious imitation.

I have a class-clown knack for mimicry, aka “doing impressions”-- mostly of people in my social circles, not celebrities. But when I started playing guitar, this talent caused me to imitate the singers I admired, even though I was only trying to emulate them.

My “impression” of, say, Louisiana native Levon Helm wasn’t too bad for a Philadelphia PA teenager. But the problem was that, once I started singing, I truly couldn’t “hear” how I’d lost or abandoned my authentic speaking voice.

Sometimes my friends, i.e. my tiny audience, would gently warn me about this tendency. But even becoming self-conscious about it didn’t cure the problem; it was as if I’d incorporated the “accent” into the music.

When, years later, I heard an old tape of my singing from that period, I cringed at my obvious “fake”-sounding accent on some of the songs.

I eventually overcame this bad habit, and “found” my own voice, such as it is. But as a sixtysomething strummer, I still occasionally catch myself veering into imitation.

I’m sure that producers and managers coached British singers to try to sound more “American”, especially during the '60s, but I think this is mostly a natural process of imitation-- you know, the highest form of flattery.

[Balthisar]

Little/liddle is spot on. I’m always working with foreigners, and always have to remind myself to speak each word twice. Once for the “proper” way (“little”) and second for the way that we sloppy Americans always pronounce things (“liddle”).

[John_W.Kennedy]

The lovely Andrea Corr, I have noticed, sings with an American accent, not only in English, but even in Gaelic, though when speaking she is obviously Irish. (She also writes lyrics in more or less American English, except in her solo album, “Ten Feet High”, which, tellingly, was not sold in America.)

[Swarfinger]

It’s not just Americans listening to British singers who have noticed this accent-losing thing. As an English rock fan for - ahem - some decades, I’ve often wondered why Irish singers (e.g. Bono of U2) or Scottish singers (e.g. Jim Reid of The Jesus and Mary Chain) don’t sound Irish or Scottish when they sing, but definitely do when they speak. Even marked English regional accents (e.g. Brian Johnson of AC/DC, who speaks in broad Geordie, one of the most extreme regional dialects) tend to get masked when singing.

[Andy_L]

@Swarfinger

It’s not just Americans listening to British singers who have noticed this accent-losing thing. As an English rock fan for - ahem - some decades, I’ve often wondered why Irish singers (e.g. Bono of U2) or Scottish singers (e.g. Jim Reid of The Jesus and Mary Chain) don’t sound Irish or Scottish when they sing, but definitely do when they speak. Even marked English regional accents (e.g. Brian Johnson of AC/DC, who speaks in broad Geordie, one of the most extreme regional dialects) tend to get masked when singing.

Years ago, I noticed something amusing in an interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger - he spoke with his strong (particularly strong 30 years ago) accent throughout the interview, except when he used Hollywood jargon, so in the midst of a strongly accented sentence, phrases like “in production” would sound jarringly American.

[BigT]

@Hari_Seldon

In today’s column, Why don’t British singers sound British when they sing? - The Straight Dope, I would like to correct Cecil on one minor point. Americans don’t say “liddle” for “little”. If there were a word “liddle”, it would differ, not in the consonant, but in the length of the first vowel. Two clearer examples are “rider” vs. “writer” and “ladder” vs. “latter”. Which is striking because vowel length is almost never a distinguishing feature in English. The consonant in each case is a tap of the roof of the mouth, or a near tap, with the tongue.

A propos his main point, I was once (probably around 1980) in a cafe in Strassbourg with a German friend when a pair came in and started singing American rock in a perfect American accent. I remarked on this and my friend claimed that they might not even speak English, but had learned to imitate American rockers. I was not able to confirm this.

Maybe some people do, but I sure pronounce “writer” and “rider” and “latter” and “ladder” in the exact same way. I specifically remember hearing about a Ghostrider movie and first thinking it was about Ghostwriter, a PBS kids show about a ghost that could only interact with the rest of the world by reading and writing (to kids he deemed worthy).

Maybe there is a distinction in your accent, but it’s lost on me. This is not uncommon if the person doesn’t make the distinction. That said, there is another common issue where people think they say things differently than they do. This arises from two sources: first, they often say the word alone and are concentrating on it, rather than in a sentence. And, second, we do things in our mind that we think are distinct but are nearly or even completely inaudible outside our own heads.

All I know for sure is that I can’t tell a difference, either in the speech of others or my own.

[BigT]

I’d say mimicry (conscious or not) and loss of distinction in elongation, pitch, and clearer diction are both issues. Depending on the singer and the listener, either one can seem bigger than the other.

I, for example, can easily hear The Beatle’s accents when they sing, even though it sounds different than when they speak. The vowels do not sound like American vowels. But I know other people who swear they sound completely American.

[Evan_Drake]

Certainly to me, British, Americans, notably from the NE, say liddle for little, and wawder for water.
Disconcerting, but then we sound funny to them.

[Fiendish_Astronaut]

I’m not a voice coach so someone correct me if I’m wrong but American accents are very twangy and I actually think that’s the reason many singers sound American. As a vocal technique using twang narrows the larynx which allows a singer to reach a higher pitch whilst at the same time sounding clearer and more distinct. It allows the singer to add modulation to their voice more easily. Although I’m sure there is some influence from great American singers (pop music is especially derivative), I just think that it’s people using twang rather than mimicking American accents.

[RobDog]

Minor nitpick, and it probably doesn’t make too much of a difference to the overall point of the article, but England, Great Britain and the UK are not the same things.

[MacLir]

@Little_Brother_1

This anecdotal comment is a far cry from the nuanced linguistic analysis in the piece, but FWIW…

Based on my own experience as a thoroughly amateur singer/guitar strummer, my sense is that this phenomenon is generally a matter of unconscious imitation.

I have a class-clown knack for mimicry, aka “doing impressions”-- mostly of people in my social circles, not celebrities. But when I started playing guitar, this talent caused me to imitate the singers I admired, even though I was only trying to emulate them.

My “impression” of, say, Louisiana native Levon Helm wasn’t too bad for a Philadelphia PA teenager. But the problem was that, once I started singing, I truly couldn’t “hear” how I’d lost or abandoned my authentic speaking voice.

Sometimes my friends, i.e. my tiny audience, would gently warn me about this tendency. But even becoming self-conscious about it didn’t cure the problem; it was as if I’d incorporated the “accent” into the music.

When, years later, I heard an old tape of my singing from that period, I cringed at my obvious “fake”-sounding accent on some of the songs.

I eventually overcame this bad habit, and “found” my own voice, such as it is. But as a sixtysomething strummer, I still occasionally catch myself veering into imitation.

I’m sure that producers and managers coached British singers to try to sound more “American”, especially during the '60s, but I think this is mostly a natural process of imitation-- you know, the highest form of flattery.

I came in to say almost exactly the same thing. I learned certain folksongs with a dialect, and I’m not real sure I could sing them without it. :rolleyes:

Being able to carry that over to speaking made me the designated character actor in highschool dramatics.

[Irishman]

@Hari_Seldon

In today’s column, Why don’t British singers sound British when they sing? - The Straight Dope, I would like to correct Cecil on one minor point. Americans don’t say “liddle” for “little”. If there were a word “liddle”, it would differ, not in the consonant, but in the length of the first vowel. Two clearer examples are “rider” vs. “writer” and “ladder” vs. “latter”. Which is striking because vowel length is almost never a distinguishing feature in English. The consonant in each case is a tap of the roof of the mouth, or a near tap, with the tongue.

I’m not following. Americans use an alveolar tap for both d and t in double consonant words. That’s why ladder and latter sound the same. I cannot distinguish any vowel distinction between writer and rider or ladder and latter in my dialect. Same thing for little and “liddle”.

@BigT

Maybe there is a distinction in your accent, but it’s lost on me. This is not uncommon if the person doesn’t make the distinction. That said, there is another common issue where people think they say things differently than they do. This arises from two sources: first, they often say the word alone and are concentrating on it, rather than in a sentence. And, second, we do things in our mind that we think are distinct but are nearly or even completely inaudible outside our own heads.

I think the second is a big factor - we think we are making a distinction that we hear but nobody else actually hears in our speaking.

[Melbourne]

@Irishman

I’m not following. Americans use an alveolar tap for both d and t in double consonant words. That’s why ladder and latter sound the same. I cannot distinguish any vowel distinction between writer and rider or ladder and latter in my dialect. Same thing for little and “liddle”.
.

I have a very faint generic American / (mid west modified by arizona modified by Australia) accent. My d is more forward than my t. I vocalize the following vowel differently.

Liddle and little are different. But that may be because liddle is a made-up word that I pronounce more carefully.

Writer and rider are different. I can’t speed up very much, because the leading “W” forces me to pronounce the word more carefully.

Latter and ladder are the same sound. I can pronounce them differently if I speak slowly and enunciate carefully, but as soon as I speed up, “latter” moves to “ladder”.

[BigT]

@Melbourne

Writer and rider are different. I can’t speed up very much, because the leading “W” forces me to pronounce the word more carefully.

Are you saying you actually pronounce the W? That would indeed make a difference, but I’ve never heard anyone in any dialect do that. Both rider and writer start with the same sound, the English initial R.

This can be formed with pursed lips and a raised tongue, just a raised tongue, or with the teeth and bottom lip, but I’ve never heard anyone who did it differently with “wr-” words.

[Irishman]

@Melbourne

I have a very faint generic American / (mid west modified by arizona modified by Australia) accent. My d is more forward than my t. I vocalize the following vowel differently.

That’s weird, because d and t are made from the same mouth position with the difference being that d is vocalized while t is not.

Liddle and little are different. But that may be because liddle is a made-up word that I pronounce more carefully.

Almost everyone will make a distinction when trying to enunciate. The question is what do other people hear you say when you are taking casually?

Writer and rider are different. I can’t speed up very much, because the leading “W” forces me to pronounce the word more carefully.

I’m with the above, you pronounce the w distinctly from the r?

Latter and ladder are the same sound. I can pronounce them differently if I speak slowly and enunciate carefully, but as soon as I speed up, “latter” moves to “ladder”.

That’s the alveolar tap I discussed.

Notice Spanish speaks may use that for r inside a word.

[Weisshund]

@Irishman

That’s weird, because d and t are made from the same mouth position with the difference being that d is vocalized while t is not.

That may be why people where i live (florida) say i talk funny.
Supposedly i have a pennsylvania dutch accent, i’ve never noticed.
D my tongue is on the front edge of my pallet, right on the ridge.
T my tongue is in my teeth almost like i am biting it.

And now i suddenly feel self conscious about what my mouth is doing when i am talking funny:smack:

[Johanna]

In AmE the difference between ladder and latter is duration of the vowel. In ladder it’s held slightly longer, because [d] is a voiced sound, so more voice is in the mix. Although the [t] becomes voiced /d/ and therefore indistringuishable in itself from [d], the word with more voice has the vowel last longer.

[Irishman]

@Weisshund

Supposedly i have a pennsylvania dutch accent, i’ve never noticed.
D my tongue is on the front edge of my pallet, right on the ridge.
T my tongue is in my teeth almost like i am biting it.

That sounds like it is almost a soft “th” sound.

@Johanna

In AmE the difference between ladder and latter is duration of the vowel. In ladder it’s held slightly longer, because [d] is a voiced sound, so more voice is in the mix. Although the [t] becomes voiced /d/ and therefore indistringuishable in itself from [d], the word with more voice has the vowel last longer.

Okay, at least I now understand what is meant by “a longer vowel”. I suppose it is possible some dialects are able to distinguish this, but I don’t recall having noticed this myself. The two words as typically pronounced during casual usage are indistinguishable to me except via context. The alveolar tap shortens the d and vocalizes the t.

It’s fascinating the variations in pronunciation that we discover.