In general when you sing you don't have an accent unless it's a ''Put On Accent'' which is quiet dilebrate, but there are some exceptions. If the song your are singing is written by yourself then you wouldn't normally fall into a forign or different county accent because you wouldn't have even heard the song before as it's your own work. As I said above about putting on an accent, this usually only happenes in pop songs and it's mostly English and Irish singers who will try and sing in an American voice. I beleive this is done solely to appeal to a wider audience to gain more sales of their music. Then there are the odd few who actually sing songs in their own local accent and are embarrassed by it and change to singing in an American voice.

But it's not only the pop singers who do it. Some well known folk artists who for one reason or another changed their voices. For example have a listen to the early Wolfe Tones songs and wheather it's Brian Warfield or Tommy Byrne doing the lead singing you can really hear the different in their accents. The older stuff have a more country sound, when I say country I'm talking about outside Dublin. Then listen to their music from the 1980s onwards and you'll certainly hear the difference.   The 'tones song The Valley Of Knockanure for example which was released in 1970 on the album ''Up The Rebels'' has Tommy Byrne on lead vocals with a ''Country Accent''. Now this may have been done to appeal to the masses outside ''The Pale''.Derek has always sang with a mixture of Dublin and Country in his songs, he even changes within the same song but for whatever reason by the 1980s all of The Wolfe Tones sang with their own natural voice.

Another of The Folfies, Christy Moore who from the 1960s to the late 70s always had a Dublin accent when doing live gigs and even his recorded materal but then started singing in his own natural Kildare voice. This was a compleat transformation for Christy and his fans. He must have being putting on this false Dublin brogue to ''Fit In'' with the crowd. When Christy started out he was based around the pubs and clubs in Dublin because that's where the ballad boom was taking place. Examples of his change can be found in his early recordings, namely, The Ballad Of James Larkin where you would think he was born and bread in Dublin, to his later songs from the 70s.

I'm not knocking singers here, far from it, we all here it when a friend goes abroad to work and comes back a few months later with an English, American or where ever them have being with the accent of the country they were living in. So it's not only the singers that do it, some people are more susceptible than others at picking it up and again put it on to ''Fit In'' Another example in the folk world would have been The Clancy Brothers And Tommy Makem. Apart from Liam Clancy the others including Tommy sang ''With'' their own County accent while Liam always sang with a netural voice even though he was away from home as long as his brothers. It's not an easy one to explain as there are many possible explanations and reasons.