Non-Singing Voice

"You know what? You can't even sing! Your voice was dubbed!"

— Miss Piggy (to Charles Grodin), The Great Muppet Caper

A trope most prevalent in Western Animation, but it can occur elsewhere. An actor is often cast into a role for which they can provide a great voice, but not always do the casting agents manage to get someone that can sing as well. Or, more rarely, their singing voice just doesn't sound enough like them for the producers' liking. A second actor will be brought in to dub the songs, and this isn't always as noticeable as one might think.

If the actor is supposed to be playing a musical instrument while singing, two doubles may well be used.

Most Japanese voice artists sing the Image Song for their characters regardless of their talent, although again this isn't always the case.

This is also an Omnipresent Trope in Bollywood movies, where the singers who dub over the actors are called playback singers.

Less frequently, concessions will be made to work around a voice actor with a less than pleasant voice. Sometimes, this trope can be done for Rule of Funny by having a character's separately performed singing voice deliberately sound nothing like their speaking voice.

Compare Talent Double and Singing Voice Dissonance. The Song Remains the Same usually brings this trope as a secondary effect, as the original voice actor ends up becoming the singing replacement for the local one.

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Examples:

Advertising

• In the FreeCreditReport.com commercials, the lead actor, Eric Violette, is dubbed by the commercials' composer, Dave Muhlenfeld, because of Violette's heavy French Canadian aaccent.

Anime

• Aggretsuko: Retsuko's Metal Scream is provided by a man in all versions (Series director Rarecho for the original Japanese, Death Metal vocalist Jamison Boaz in the English dub).
• Aikatsu! uses an idol unit specially made for the show to provide the girls' singing voices, even though there are some singers (such as Minako Kotobuki, Kaori Ishihara, Manami Numakura and Tomoya Kurosawa, who performs the opening to Doki Doki! PreCure) among them. Justified that songs in the first season are lifted straight from the arcade game of the same name which appeared earlier. Also, Naoto is voiced by Toshiyuki Toyonaga, but the singing is done by Kenta Harada, the vocalist of Rey.
• Iwasawa and Yui in Angel Beats! are both voiced by big name voice actors (Miyuki Sawashiro and Eri Kitamura, respectively), but their singing voices are by marina and LiSA.
• Another anime where this happens is for the majority of the characters in BECK, in which their voices are often replaced whenever they sing. For example, Koyuki's singing voice is provided by rock singer Kazuya Hirabayashi. It's painfully obvious, too. Funnily enough, the dub averts this, as Greg Ayres and many others do their own singing.
• In the English dub of the Bubblegum Crisis OVA, Sinda Nichols did not do her own singing for Priss. Instead, her songs were covered by various artists (usually Joyce Leigh Bowden).
• Carole & Tuesday has American R&B singer Nai Br. XXX and Japanese-American pop and R&B singer Celeina Ann as the singing voices for the titular characters respectively. In fact, many character's voices are different when singing despite their original voices being singers themselves. Some examples include Angela and Crystal, whose singing voices are Alisa and Lauren Dyson instead of their original voice actresses (Sumire Uesaka and Maaya Sakamoto respectively). This is because all the songs are entirely sung in English by native English singers.
• The Italian dub of Digimon Xros Wars: The Young Hunters Who Leapt Through Time has Nene, usually voiced by Eva Padoan, being voiced by Noemi Smorra (the singer for the Italian versions of multiple Pretty Cure theme songs) when she is singing in Episode 10.
• In yet another anime exception, the theme song from Excel♡Saga is sung by Excel and Hyatt— but not their normal speaking voice actors. This being Excel Saga, it is lampshaded in one episode where Excel and Hyatt meet their singing voice actors, in full Excel and Hyatt cosplay, at a bowling alley:
  Excel: Why Kobayashi? Why Mikako? [the voice actors' names]
  Hyatt: I do so hate knockoffs.
• Yellow Belmont in Genesis Climber MOSPEADA had different voice actors for not only speaking and singing roles, but also gender roles. For Yellow's female Idol Singer persona, Mine Matsuki performed both speaking and singing voices, while Hirotaka Suzuoki was Yellow's normal male speaking voice.
  • A third VA was brought in for the OVA sequel Love Live Alive, as Jin Haneoka performed as Yellow's male singing voice.
  • In the Robotech adaptation, Yellow, or "Lancer," was once again voiced by two different voice actors: Cam Clarke for speaking roles and Michael Bradley for singing. Unlike the original series, both actors were male, although Clarke did make a rather unconvincing attempt at an effeminate voice.
• Subverted in Haruhi-chan. Yuki talks as she usually does through the whole opening theme while everyone else sings, looking like the "work-around voice actor with less than pleasant voice" variation. Then came the end of episode 6, where she suddenly pulls out a karaoke mic and starts singing "Paradise Lost" to get Achakura to forget the argument they just had.
• Subverted in Hidamari Sketch where the characters (and voice actresses) visit a karaoke parlor and sing nothing like they have for the openings/Image Songs, but rather sing more like how their characters would.
• The Macross franchise tends to have different singing and speaking voices for the singer characters. Exceptions include Mari Iijima (Lynn Minmay), Megumi Nakajima (Ranka Lee), and Minori Suzuki (Freyja Wion).
  • In the Robotech adaptation of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Rebecca Forstadt did her own singing. Some fans thought it was okay, but she clearly lacked Iijima's professional music talent.
• In Ocean's English dub of Mobile Suit Gundam SEED and Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny, Lacus Clyne is voiced by two different actresses when speaking normally (Chantal Strand, even though she's a singer in real-life) and when singing (Jillian Michaels) - it's pretty obvious in SEED, but much less so in Destiny. In the original Japanese, Rie Tanaka performs both, though.
• In My Hero Academia, the song Jiro and others perform at the School Festival, "Hero too", is done by Chrissy Costanza of Against the Current, not any of Jiro's regular voice actresses.
• Nana has two female characters the titular Nana O. and Reira had their singing voices done by Anna Tsuchiya and Olivia Lufkin in the anime, even though their Japanese voice actresses, (Romi Park and Aya Hirano), are singers themselves.
• Naruto: A filler arc had an example in the Hoshigakure arc's English dub. Natsuhi was mainly voiced by Kirsten Potter but her memorable lullaby "Natsuhiboshi" was sung by ADR director Mary Elizabeth McGlynn for unclear reasons.
• The Italian dub of Ojamajo Doremi had a pecular case with the lullaby Onpu sings to Hana-chan in an early episode of the second season. Not only it had a different voice actress replacing Emanuela Pacotto (which is very blatant since the singing voice is clearly deeper than the speaking one), but the exact same recording of the lullaby is also used later on when other characters are singing it, meaning that at least five different characters (Onpu, Onpu's mom, Doremi, Hazuki and Aiko) end up having the same singing voice.
• In One Piece Film: Red, Uta's singing voice is provided by Ado - this applies in both Japanese and English despite that her Japanese and English voice actresses are singers themselves.
• Haruhi Fujioka from Ouran High School Host Club had to lipsync when it was revealed that she's unable to sing, and she doesn't get an image song! Which means more voice actor irony.
• Phoron's singing voice in the Polyphonica series is clearly not his own, since it's quite a bit higher than his usual speaking voice. Hiroshi Kamiya, Phoron's voice actor, does do his own singing for Phoron's image songs, but the voice he uses to contract Corti isn't his.
• While the Pretty Series usually averts this trope, Pretty Rhythm: Dear My Future does this for PURETTY by using a standard set of voice actors for their speaking voice and the actual idols for their singing voices.
• Ranma ½: Angela Costain did not do her own singing for Nabiki Tendo. Saffron Henderson sung for her instead. All the other voice actors did their own singing, notably Cathy Weseluck as Shampoo.
• Reign of the Seven Spellblades: Carlos Whitrow's singing performances in the anime are done by Mion Yano in episode 7 and Shachi Tsumugi (who also sings the ending theme) in episode 15, rather than either of Carlos's voice actors.
• For the three North American dub CDs released of Sailor Moon, most of the show's voice actresses don't sing their characters' image songs. Jennifer Cihi sings Serena's, songwriter Shandi Sinnamon does Amy's, Sandy Howell does Raye's vocals, and Patricia Tollett does Lita's. One of Howell's songs was also used in the actual show when Raye sings. Katie Griffin (her speaking voice) is also a professional singer and wanted to do her own singing, but the songs were all recorded out of Los Angeles, while the voice acting was done in Toronto.
• For Saiyuki's Hakkai it's played straight. One can only imagine how terrible his singing voice is, as his Image Song is spoken-word. He's left out of the group song entirely. Lampshaded by Minekura when she referred to the other three VAs as "-8" ("Minus Eight"), with Hakkai's name being written with the kanji for "eight."
  • Akira Ishida's singing voice doesn't seem to be as bad as he thinks it is (it's not good, but at least it's on key). Still, he refuses to sing if he has to do any image songs.
    • He did sing in the two collaborations between the Saiyuki and Knight Hunters casts, though. Apparently, that was too much Fanservice to pass up.
    • He also did the Image Song "Kageri no Fuuin" for Harukanaru Toki no Naka de's Abe no Yasuaki; a remake version of it was used in the Hachiyou Shou TV anime as the Ending Theme for Yasuaki's character episode. The song might be a bit strange, but then again, it's Yasuaki. This, unfortunately, is his only normal song in the entire series; otherwise they are just talk tracks.
• The intro songs to Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei are sung by the anime's voice cast — except for Hiroshi Kamiya, the voice of Zetsubou-sensei himself, whose lines are sung by a (very good) sound-alike. Hiroshi Kamiya does sing one of the ending themes himself very nicely, actually.
• Scott Pilgrim Takes Off: Envy Adams is voiced by Brie Larson, but her singing is performed by Emily Haines of Metric. This is strange considering Larson is a talented singer and did Envy's singing herself when she played her in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.
• In Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online, ReoNa provided the singing voice of the character Elsa Kanzaki, even though her voice actress, Yōko Hikasa, is a singer in real-life. This is even more obvious in the English dub, where they still use the audio ReoNa recorded rather than having someone translate it into English.
• Some Tenchi Muyo! characters have different singing voice actors.
  • One exception is Petrea Burchard, who only sung as Ryoko in a karaoke scene where it didn't matter how good she was. Burchard admits that she can't sing, so when she was asked to sing "Up Walk in Galaxy" (the ending to Tenchi Universe), she tried to say no, but the producers insisted that she try, believing that she actually could sing some since she was a capable vocal actress. Burchard hesitantly agreed to give it a shot, and she was given the song and told to practice. She did, but when it came time to recording, she nervously made the entire production staff sit as far back in the room as they could. They started recording, and the staff let Burchard get about half-way through the song before they finally believed that she couldn't sing. Diane Michelle ended up singing the final song.
  • Michelle also sang Your Hiroshi in the Magical Girl Pretty Sammy OVAs as Chihiro Kawaii instead of either of her speaking voice actors Ellen Gerstell or Rebecca Forstadt (both are also singers).
• Painfully obvious in the Swedish dub of Toei's Puss in Boots, where the young princess was played by Marianne Wäyrynen and her singing was done by professionally trained opera singer Anette Stridh.
• All the AI characters in Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song have a seperate singing voice talent from their actor performers.
• Due to Yoshimasa Hosoya's health concerns in regards to his voice, in 2017 he pulled out of the Ensemble Stars! idol series, and in 2018 it was announced that he would no longer be singing for Tsukiuta, either. However, in an effort to maintain continuity, instead of replacing him outright, for Tsukiuta, he will continue to do the speaking voice for his character Arata, while the singer koyomi from the band Re:ply will provide the character's singing voice.
• Ya Boy Kongming!:
  • Eiko is voiced by Kaede Hondo but her singing voice is done by 96Neko who also did the ending song.
  • Nanami Kuon is voiced by Hibiku Yamamura while her singing voice is Lezel.

Films — Animation

• All Dogs Go to Heaven: Judith Barsi voiced Anne-Marie, and the singing voice was provided by Lana Beeson. Judith was given the option to sing it herself but she cried hysterically during the audition because at home, she was being tragically abused by her father, who killed her almost right after all her lines were recorded, and the filmmakers decided it was best not to push her.
• During the musical number "Somewhere Out There" in An American Tail, Phillip Glasser provided his own singing voice for Fievel, while Tanya was performed by Betsy Cathcart as opposed to her VA Amy Green. In the sequel An American Tail: Fievel Goes West, Cathy "Blossom" Cavadini did the speaking and singing parts for Tanya.
• Liz Callaway is easily the queen of singing animated princesses. In addition to her Disney credits listed above, she provided the singing voice for the title character of Anastasia (voiced by Meg Ryan) and Odette in The Swan Princess (voiced by Michelle Nicastro). The latter is quite baffling, since Michelle Nicastro was a musical theatre actress who played Eponine in Les Misérables, but her voice was deemed too pop for the princess. In the sequels made before her death in 2010, she would do her own singing for Odette.
  • Not only was the adult version of Anastasia given two voices, but so was the child version - for this one Lacey Chabert took over for Kirsten Dunst when it was time for the girl to sing. Interestingly for Chabert; the following year would see her on the opposite end of the trope, as in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride, she provided the speaking voice of Vitani before giving way to Crysta Macalush for the singing parts.
  • Jim Cummings performed Christopher Lloyd's singing voice in "In the Dark of the Night" in Anastasia.
  • John Cusack was Dimitri's speaking voice, but his singing was done by Jonathan Dokuchitz.
• Arlo the Alligator Boy: In specific foreign dubs. Arlo has the most of these in a total of five dubs — in French, German, Korean, Latin American Spanish, and Mandarin Chinese. Bertie, Ansel and Alia have singing doubles in the latter two, Marcellus has one in the fourth, and Edmée has one in the fifth.
• In Batman: Gotham by Gaslight, Selina Kyle is voiced by Jennifer Carpenter, while her singing voice for her song "Can You Tame Wild Women" was done by Grey Griffin.
• The Book of Life:
  • In the Mexican Spanish dub, Jorge is voiced by Carlos del Campo while his singing voice is provided by Ulises Maynardo Zavala.
  • In the original English version, young Manolo is voiced by Emil Bastien Bouffard, but Joe Matthews does his singing.
• In Cats Don't Dance, Sawyer's singing voice was provided by Natalie Cole, and the speaking voice was Jasmine Guy^note who incidentally had a modestly successful singing career during her time on A Different World. Likewise, Darla Dimple's singing voice is by Lindsay Ridgeway, and her speaking voice by Ashley Peldon.
• In Cinderella III: A Twist in Time, Cinderella has speaking by Jennifer Hale and singing by Tami Tappan, while Anastasia has speaking by Tress MacNeille and singing by Lesli Margherita.
  • The original sometimes gets mistaken for this, as both Ilene Woods and Helene Stanley have been credit with the role. In reality, Woods performered Cinderella's speaking and singing. Stanely was Cinderella's rotoscope model.
  • This was subverted in Sofia the First: Once Upon a Princess, however, as Hale performed the song "True Sisters" as Cinderella. Whether or not she did so in Once Upon a Studio remains unclear.
• The film adaptation of Coraline sees the Other Father (voiced by John Hodgman) sing a catchy little ditty about Coraline, in the voice of John Linnell of They Might Be Giants. This was a Shout-Out to the fact that, originally, the film was going to be a musical with songs written by TMBG. As awesome as that could have been, it apparently ruined the creepy tone of the movie, so the idea was scrapped. "The Other Father Song" is the only remnant of the musical idea.
• The Disney Animated Canon: The Disney Renaissance era did this frequently.
  • Everyone in Mulan, except for Mushu, Yao and Chien Po. The heroine's VA was Ming-Na Wen, but her singing voice was provided by Lea Salonga. Shang's speaking voice was B.D. Wong, and his singing voice was Donny Osmond^note BD Wong is also a singer, but the reason for the dubbing is apparently because Donny Osmond's singing voice sounds more like him than his own. while in the Chinese version, his speaking and singing voice was (awesomely) Jackie Chan. Not even Grandmother Fa was safe from this. Her speaking voice was June Foray, and her singing voice (for her brief solo) was Marni Nixon (who was very famous for doing singing voices for Deborah Kerr, among others, in the 1950s). Eddie Murphy, Harvey Fierstein and Jerry Tondo all did their own singing.
  • Everybody in Aladdin had a different singing voice, save for Genie and Jafar (and in the sequels, Iago as well). Aladdin's speaking VA is Scott Weinger, singing provided by Brad Kane. Jasmine's speaking voice was done by Linda Larkin while her singing was also performed by Lea Salonga (Liz Callaway in the sequels). The Peddler sings with Bruce Adler's voice because Robin Williams couldn't hit the high notes in "Arabian Nights".
  • Pocahontas' VA was Irene Bedard, and her singing voice is that of Judy Kuhn. According to the former, they cast the singing voice first and brought her in later.
  • Esmeralda in The Hunchback of Notre Dame was spoken and sung by Demi Moore and Heidi Mollenhauer, respectively (Moore was going to do her own but said she wouldn't sound good enough). The rest of the cast did their own singing.
  • More actresses Liz Callaway has pretended to be:
    • Neve Campbell (Kiara in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride). Oddly enough if one watches an episode of Party of Five, Campbell's singing voice is actually quite decent.
    • Linda Larkin (Jasmine in both Aladdin sequels, replacing Lea Salonga from the first film—which is perfect, seeing as it's ridiculously easy for someone to mistake Liz for Lea and vice versa).
  • Hercules had no fewer than three voices - Tate Donovan as adult Herc, Josh Keaton when he's younger and Roger Bart when he's younger and singing. This was originally to be averted in young Herc's case, as Keaton did originally record his own rendition of "Go the Distance" before it was later replaced with Bart's version after Keaton hit puberty.
  • Matthew Broderick can sing, but due to being more of a Lyric Baritone than a tenor, Joseph Williams (son of John Williams and lead singer of Toto) replaces Simba for singing in The Lion King (1994) (and Cam Clarke afterwards). Young Simba is also replaced (Jason Weaver instead of Jonathan Taylor Thomas- and Evan Saucedo for the extra song in the 2003 DVD release), and Jeremy Irons sings some of Scar's lyrics, but partway through, the harsher lyrics were replaced by that of Jim Cummings, since Irons blew his voice out doing the "YOU WON'T GET A SNIFF WITHOUT ME!" line in "Be Prepared", resulting in Cummings subbing for him. Both young and adult Nala also have different voices for singing.
  • An early draft of The Jungle Book (1967) was originally going to have Thurl "Tony the Tiger" Ravenscroft as the singing voice of Shere Khan. In the film proper, George Sanders refused/was not available, depending on who you listen to. So Shere Khan's only sung line in "That's What Friends Are For", despite displaying a fine baritone singing voice elsewhere, was instead done by Ravencroft's fellow singer in The Mellomen barbershop quartet Bill Lee.
  • While not technically part of the Disney Animated Canon, A Goofy Movie has Aaron Lohr sub in for Jason Marsden as Max's singing voice.
  • 101 Dalmatians is possibly the earliest case; Roger's speaking voice is done by Ben Wright and his singing voice by Bill Lee (which would explain the inexplicable American accent he develops).
  • While Frozen averts this in the original English language release with the exception of 5-year-old Anna (where Livvy Stubenrauch was dubbed by Katie Lopez), most foreign dubs have to assign the main characters two voice artists: one for speaking parts, and one for singing parts. And ALL members of the main cast get at least one song to themselves.
    • The Dutch dub doesn't do this, but the German dub does - which is odd, given they both cast Willemijn Verkaik (original German and Dutch Elphaba) as Elsa, with her singing and speaking for the Dutch dub and only singing in the German dub.
    • This is also averted in the Arabic, Danish, Estonian, Finnish, Flemish, European French, Hebrew, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Russian, Latin American Spanish and Swedish dubs.
    • An odd example for the French dubs: Anais Delva speaks and sings for Elsa in the European French dub. The Canadian French version dubs Elsa's speaking voice with a new actress, but keeps Delva's singing.
  • The Brazilian dub for Disney movies employed it at times, most notably with Ariel, who had three different singing voices - a child singer in the original dub, replaced with a teenager in the 1997 re-release, and in-between, a third singer in the TV series. And that's not counting how her speaking voice actress eventually learned to sing and got a chance to do so in a sequel (and she even performs "Part of Your World" live).
    • The third singer also did the songs for Jasmine, Nala, Pocahontas and Megara.
  • Moana Everyone in the cast did their own singing except for Moana's father, Chief Tui. His speaking voice is Temuera Morrison, while his singing voice is provided by Chris Jackson. The story goes that Lin-Manuel Miranda, while writing the songs for Moana, used the cast of Hamilton to record demos (as he was still involved with the show at that time), and used Jackson (who played Washington in the show) stand in for Morrison. They ended up liking his recording so much that they used it in the final movie. ^note Philipa Soo, who plays Alexander Hamilton's wife Eliza in the show, also has a small cameo in Moana for the same reason.
  • In The Rescuers Down Under, the villain McLeach is voiced by George C. Scott, but during the part where he sings his twisted version of "Home on the Range" his singing is done by Frank Welker.
  • Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure has three examples of this:
    • Buster's speaking voice is Chazz Palminteri, while his singing voice is Jess Harnell.
    • Scamp's speaking voice is Scott Wolf and his singing voice is Roger Bart.
    • Angel's speaking voice is Alyssa Milano and her singing voice is Susan Egan. Funnily enough, Alyssa did have a brief stint as a pop star in Japan when she was a teenager.
  • Oliver & Company was notable for casting two major pop stars, Billy Joel and Bette Midler, as two of the main characters and giving them show-stopping musical numbers. But they double-cast the other two characters who had singing parts — Natalie Gregory/Myhanh Tran for Jenny, and Sheryl Lee Ralph/Ruth Pointer (of The Pointer Sisters) for Rita.
  • Alma in Encanto is the only Madrigal family whose singing voice isn't the same as their voice actor, with Olga Merediz and Yaneth Waldman being the singing voice in the English and Spanish dub respectively as opposed to María Cecilia Botero.
• In Gumby: The Movie, Tara is voiced by Patti Morse, but her singing voice is done by Melisa Kary when she sings "Take Me Away" near the end.
• Otto the gorilla from The Haunted World of El Superbeasto is voiced by Tom Kenny; his singing voice for his Schoolhouse Rock! parody song is done by Chris Hardwick.
• How to Train Your Dragon 2 features one song "For The Dancing and the Dreaming", sung by Stoick and Valka. Cate Blanchett is Valka's speaking voice, but Mary Jane Wells provides the singing. Gerard Butler however, still sings for Stoick.
• The late 80s Jetsons Made-for-TV Movie Rockin' with Judy Jetson had Judy's singing done by BJ Ward rather than Janet Waldo.
• In the animated The King and I, as like its live-action counterpart, Anna had a separate voice actor as her singing voice. Miranda Richardson spoke, Christiane Noll sang. The Prince also has Allen D. Hong as the speaking voice, and David Burnham as the singing. Tuptim was voiced by Armi Arabe, and sung by Tracy Venner.
• Ladybug & Cat Noir: The Movie: In the French language version, singers Lou and Elliot handle the singing voices for Ladybug and Cat Noir, respectively, while their voice actors from the show handle their dialogue. Lou reprises her role for the English dub, while Cat Noir gets a new non-singing voice in Drew Ryan Scott. In the French dub, Cerise Calixte provides Tikki's singing voice while Marie Nonnenmacher provides her dialogue.
• In The Little Mermaid (1968 Soviet film), actress Nina Gulyayeva voiced the Mermaid's dialogues and lyric soprano Viktoriya Ivanova provided her singing.
• In the Looney Tunes film Daffy Duck's Quackbusters, Daffy's singing voice is provided by Mel Torme. Lampshaded though, in that Daffy swallows a bottle of mouthwash designed to give him Mel Torme's voice.
  • This may have been the inspiration for the Duck Dodgers episode "Talent Show A-Go-Go", in which Dodgers uses some Applied Phlebotinum to swap voices with Tom Jones. In addition to Jones voicing Dodgers, we also get Joe Alaskey voicing Tom Jones trying to sing while "sounding like Daffy Duck".
• In The Man Called Flintstone, Fred's singing voice for the song "Teammates" is provided by future regular Fred Flintstone voice actor Henry Corden. Corden does such a good job here mimicking Alan Reed's performance that it can be hard to tell the difference.
• In the original Ukrainian version of Mavka: The Forest Song, Nataliya Denisenko voiced Mavka and Khrystyna Soloviy did Mavka's singing voice.
• Monster Mash (2000) had separate voice actors to do singing and talking for the three main characters.
  • Drac's speaking voice was done by Ian James Corlett, with Jason Michas doing Drac's singing.
  • Scott McNeil voiced Wolf when he was speaking, with Wolf's singing done by David Pavlovitch.
  • Frank was voiced by David Sobolov when speaking and by W. Harlan May when singing.
• The Nightmare Before Christmas has the main character, Jack, with a speaking voice provided by Chris Sarandon and singing voice provided by composer Danny Elfman. With no Burton/Elfman involvement in Oogie's Revenge, Chris Sarandon went on to sing all of Jack's songs in that game. When casting, Elfman was chosen to provide Jack's singing parts, and then Sarandon was cast because his speaking voice sounded close enough to Elfman's.
• Towards the end of Paul Winchell's tenure as the voice of Tigger (such as Pooh's Grand Adventure, A Winnie the Pooh Thanksgiving or Winnie the Pooh: A Valentine for You), Jim Cummings, Pooh's voice actor and Winchell's stand-in and eventual successor, had to provide Tigger's singing. Frankie J. Galasso does the singing did Christopher Robin rather than Brady Bluhm and Steve Schatzberg sings for Piglet rather than John Fiedler
• Pound Puppies and the Legend of Big Paw had two characters with separate voice actors for talking and singing:
  • Cooler's speaking voice is provided by Brennan Howard, with Ashley Hall voicing him for the songs "At the Pound", "It's All in Your Mind" and "Puppy Power's Back".
  • The titular Big Paw is voiced by Tony Longo when he speaks, with Mark Vieha voicing him for his musical number "I'm a Puppy, Too".
• In The Prince of Egypt, Val Kilmer's singing voice as Moses was provided by Amick Byram, Danny Glover (Jethro) was replaced by Broadway veteran Brian Stokes Mitchell, and Sally Dworsky dubbed the singing role for Miriam (Sandra Bullock). And proving that being a Dame is no barrier to such things, Helen Mirren has Linda Dee Shayne step in as the Queen's singing voice. Ralph Fiennes, Michelle Pfeiffer, Martin Short and Steve Martin did their own singing.
• All over the place in Quest for Camelot; Kayley is voiced by Jessalyn Gilsig (speaking) and Andrea Corr (singing); Garrett is voiced by Cary Elwes (speaking) and Bryan White (singing); Kayley's mother is voiced by Jane Seymour (speaking) and Céline Dion (singing); King Arthur is voiced by James Bond (speaking) and Steve Perry (singing). Notably, the film was not a musical when it was first produced, but became one later in development - hence the reason more singing actors weren't cast.
• There are a couple of examples of this in Rock and Rule. Depending on which version you watch, Omar's speaking voice is either done by Paul Le Mat in the film, or Gregory Salata in the TV version; in both versions, his singing voice is done by Robin Zander. Angel's speaking voice is Susan Roman while her singing voice is Deborah Harry, and Mok's speaking voice is Don Francks while his singing voice is Lou Reed.
• Shrek: While Cameron Diaz delivers all of Princess Fiona's spoken dialogue, any time the character sings another actress or singer takes over, as Diaz's lack of singing ability is well known.
• During Robin's song "My Superhero Movie" in Teen Titans Go! To the Movies , his singing is done by Jacob Jeffries instead of Scott Menville .
• Tom and Jerry and the Wizard of Oz and its sequel, Back to Oz, sees Dorothy voiced by Grey DeLisle, while Nikki Yanofsky and Amy Pemberton do the singing in the respective movies. This is unusual though since DeLisle is a talented singer, and has also sung for others.
  • Jamie Bamber is the voice of Robin Hood in the Tom & Jerry movie "Robin Hood & His Merry Mouse, but Larry Cedar provides Robin's singing voice. Maid Marian is voiced by Grey DeLisle, but sung by Kerry Norton Griffith (Bamber's wife, incidentally).
• Though promotional material would have you believe that Lee Ann Womack played Becky Thatcher in Tom Sawyer (2000), that wasn't entirely true. Womack provided only the singing voice for the character, while voice actress Hynden Walch recorded her dialogue.
• In Toy Story 2, Jessie is voiced by Joan Cusack, but her yodeling was by Mary Kay Bergman. Wheezy (normally voiced by Pixar Regular Joe Ranft) sings a reprise of the original film's "You've Got a Friend in Me" at the end, sung by Robert Goulet. The series has many first-person songs such as "When She Loved Me", "You've Got a Friend in Me", "Strange Things" and "I Will Go Sailing No More", but it's more of "music to fit the situation" instead of "character singing". Jessie's voice acting arrangement is averted in Toy Story 3: Bergman tragically died in 1999 just two weeks before the release of the second film, so Cusack did her own yodeling for the third film.
• Trolls Band Together:
  • While Andrew Rannells does his own singing for Veneer, Velvet's vocals are provided by Brianna Mazzola instead of Amy Schumer.
  • Iris Dorhn voices Baby Branch's speaking voice in the opening prologue, but his singing voice is still by Justin Timberlake but at a higher pitch.
• In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Kathleen Turner provided the speaking voice of Jessica Rabbit, while Amy Irving supplied her singing voice. In a rare reversal to most of the examples on this page, it's Amy Irving that gets credit while Turner is omitted (amusingly, her performance model is credited), though worth noting is that Irving was married to co-producer Steven Spielberg at the time of the film's release.

Films — Live-Action

• Marni Nixon (the mother of 70s soft-rock singer-songwriter Andrew Gold) was the live-action queen of this for ages (often uncredited). From The Other Wiki: Nixon's dubbing career includes:
  • The singing voice of Margaret O'Brien in The Secret Garden.
  • Providing Marilyn Monroe with a few top notes in her performance of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953). She was supposed to sing all of it but refused.
  • The singing voice for Deborah Kerr in two different films - The King and I (1956), where her vocals were skilfully intertwined with Kerr's on some tracks; and An Affair to Remember a year later. This was the first time she was acknowledged as such, as Kerr went to the papers to give her the credit (though she only said she was supplied with a few top notes).
  • The singing voice for Natalie Wood as Maria in West Side Story (1961) and also sang some parts of the score of Anita played by Rita Moreno, sharing the load with co-dubber Betty Wand and Moreno herself. In parts of the quintet setting of the song "Tonight", Nixon sings both Maria's and Anita's lines. Interestingly, there is a clip of Natalie Wood singing (in an untrained voice) "Tonight" mash-up with Nixon's dub. Wood had been trying to do her own singing and reportedly felt betrayed when she found out she was being dubbed (and although she worked very hard, she was rarely given constructive feedback and just told she was doing great, fully planning to dub her over later).
  • The singing voice for Audrey Hepburn as Eliza in My Fair Lady (1964), for which Nixon gained much notoriety, as news-eager journalists ripped apart the customary veil of secrecy. Industry buzz has said this to have been the cause of Hepburn's failing even to get nominated for an Academy Award for the demanding role. Interestingly, the DVD features the original footage of Hepburn singing, and while she's not as skilled as Nixon, she certainly doesn't embarrass herself. Most notably she refused to do another musical afterwards unless she was allowed to do her own singing.
    • In the same film, Jeremy Brett was dubbed by Bill Shirley. He was surprised to be told he was going to be dubbed, as he could sing quite well - his singing voice can be heard in one episode of Sherlock Holmes. Apparently the producers felt that his voice was too mature for Freddy.
• Rita Hayworth sang in many films, but never in her own voice. To name only a few singers who dubbed for her:
  • Martha Mears in Cover Girl. (Mears also dubbed Veronica Lake's singing in several movies.)
  • Anita Ellis in Gilda; though Hayworth did sing the acoustic guitar version of "Put the Blame on Mame". (Ellis also dubbed Vera-Ellen in Three Little Words and The Belle of New York.)
  • Jo Ann Greer in Pal Joey (which also had Trudy Erwin as Kim Novak's singing voice).
  • Nan Wynn in You Were Never Lovelier. (Hayworth also conspicuously doesn't sing in the other movie musical pairing her with Fred Astaire, You'll Never Get Rich.)
• In the film adaptation of Gypsy, Rosalind Russell's singing was dubbed over by Lisa Kirk. Natalie Wood, however, got to use her own singing voice this time.
• In The Adventures of Pinocchio Pinocchio was voiced by Jonathan Taylor Thomas. When he sings in the play he performs in, his singing voice was done by Brian May of Queen whose voice was sped up to sound childlike.
• Almost Famous: Marti Frederiksen dubbed Jason Lee's vocals.
• Susan Kiger didn't sing "Shine Your Love" in the '70s flick Angels Revenge; the singing was actually dubbed by someone named Patty Foley.
• Ava Gardner's singing was dubbed by Eileen Wilson in The Hucksters (1947), One Touch of Venus (1948) and The Bribe (1949). She was determined to put her vocal training to the test as Julie in the 1951 remake of Show Boat; Annette Warren's singing voice was nevertheless dubbed over hers, but Gardner did her own singing on the soundtrack album and in other movies of the 1950s.
• In Back to the Future, Mark Campbell was the one to sing "Johnny B. Goode" - in the place of Michael J. Fox. Fox also does not play the guitar in the final version, though he did correctly play it onscreen (albeit in the wrong key - it was shot in B, as he says, but recorded in the original B flat by Jim May). The song was credited as having been "performed by Marty McFly". (Fox does, however, do his own singing in Light of Day).
• In Ball of Fire, Barbara Stanwyck's singing on "Drum Boogie" was dubbed by Martha Tilton.
• In Bugsy Malone, all the singing is done by adults with the kids lip-syncing. As a result it's glaringly obvious in places.
• In Cannibal! The Musical, Trey Parker dubbed Robert Muratore's singing voice for "The Trapper Song": According to the commentary, they did try to have Muratore sing himself, but the results weren't very good. Meanwhile, Andrew Kemler and Edward Henwood's off-key backing vocals in the same number were left un-dubbed because Parker thought they were funny... It did also happen to add to a joke where the song gets interrupted as the characters argue about what key it's supposed to be in.
• All the singing voices in Carmen Jones were dubbed in, even though the cast featured trained singers such as Harry Belafonte and Diahann Carroll.
• Susan Alexander in Citizen Kane is forced into starring as the lead in an opera and fails due to being out of her depth. Dorothy Comingore plays Susan but the singing is done by Jean Forward. To avert Hollywood Tone-Deaf, they wrote the number to be impossibly hard to sing but also in the soprano range - while Jean is an alto. As a result, her voice sounds realistically strained.
• Confessions of a Pop Performer: Linda Regan's singing was dubbed over by Sue Martine.
• Cyd Charisse was usually dubbed in other MGM musicals if required to sing. She didn't sing in Singin' in the Rain, but India Adams sang for her in The Band Wagon and Carole Richards was her singing voice in Brigadoon and Silk Stockings. (One Cut Song recorded with India Adams for The Band Wagon ended up in the 1953 movie Torch Song, in which Joan Crawford lip-synched to it.) Eileen Wilson did Charisse's singing in Words and Music.
• A weird case in Dark City. In the theatrical cut, nightclub singer Anna Murdoch is played by Jennifer Connelly, but her singing voice is provided by Anita Kelsey (who's also heard on the soundtrack album). In the director's cut, Connelly does her own singing.
• Drew Barrymore was the only cast member who was dubbed in Everyone Says I Love You, simply because she claimed she can't sing (though her performance in Music and Lyrics seems to go against this. Then again, 50 First Dates does back her up...). Oddly enough, several of her castmates, such as Edward Norton, were instructed to sing less well because their voices were considered too good to fit in with Woody Allen's vision of normal people breaking into spontaneous musical numbers.
  • That said, an unknown singer was brought in to do Barrymore's singing on her solo "I Live in Two Worlds" in the 1986 TV adaptation of Babes in Toyland.
• In Dr. No, Honey Ryder had the speaking voice of Monica Van der Zyl (who also did the Same Language Dub of many early Bond Girls), the singing voice of Diana Coupland, and the body of Ursula Andress.
• Duets: Director Bruce Paltrow chose the actors cast in the primary roles of this film for their surprisingly good singing - with the exception of Scott Speedman, who averts this trope by playing the only main character who never sings a note. (Gwyneth Paltrow had two hit singles in Australia and New Zealand with songs from the film.) However, in the case of Ricky Kane (played by Andre Braugher), the in-story angelic nature of the character's voice forced the director to dub in a professional singer for his karaoke scenes.
• Eddie and the Cruisers had the titular Fake Band's lead singer, played by Michael Paré, dubbed with John Cafferty.
  • Likewise the sequel, Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives!, in which Cafferty as Eddie Wilson sounds even more like Springsteen than in the first film.
• The Fifth Element: Actress Maïwenn played Diva Plavalaguna, while Albanian soprano Inva Mula-Tchako provided the singing. Éric Serra mentioned that Mula-Tchako performed 85% of the composition he made, which he thought was technically impossible.
• Evan Rachel Wood plays a coloratura in Mildred Pierce, and while she does have her musical experience, here she's dubbed by Dilber Yunus and Sumi Jo.
• Flower Drum Song:
  • Nancy Kwan plays Linda Low but her singing was dubbed by BJ Baker.
  • Reiko Sato plays Helen Chao but her singing is done by Marilyn Horne.
  • Kam Tong played Dr Li and his singing was done by John Dodson.
• In Gigi, Leslie Caron's singing was all dubbed by Betty Wand except for the verse of "The Night They Invented Champagne."
• Gold Diggers of 1933 had Joan Blondell's singing dubbed over by Marian Anderson in "Remember My Forgotten Man". Blondell used her own singing voice in Dames. It was not pretty.
• In The Greatest Showman Rebecca Ferguson plays operatic soprano Jenny Lind, who was called "the Swedish Nightingale" and considered to have the best singing voice in the world. While Ferguson is a capable singer, she agreed to be dubbed by professional singer Loren Allred. She did however sing the song live on set, and did so well enough that the reactions in the film were not at all faked.
• In The Great Race, Natalie Wood's singing was once again dubbed, this time by Jackie Ward, when she sings "The Sweetheart Tree". During an earlier scene, she sings "My Country 'Tis of Thee" in her own voice, and it is noticeably off-key. Ward dubbed Wood’s singing again in Inside Daisy Clover, though you do get to hear a bit of Wood’s own singing voice on the intro to "You’re Gonna Hear from Me".
• In Gremlins, Howie Mandel voiced Gizmo the mogwai, however his singing was done by an unidentified 14 year old girl who was part of the choir for the film.
• In The Harvey Girls, Marion Doenges sang for Cyd Charisse and Virginia Rees sang for Angela Lansbury. That Lansbury didn't get to sing for herself is astounding in light of her later success in Broadway musicals in playing Mame and Mrs. Lovett. Apparently, it's because her voice sounded "too good" for a lowlife saloon singer.
• Imitation of Life (1959) has a sequence where Sarah Jane, played by Susan Kohner, is singing a song in a Bikini Bar. The singing is provided by Jo Anne Greer.
• In another seminal Soviet comedy, The Irony of Fate, the leading female role was played by a Polish actress Barbara Brylska, who also was overdubbed for both her speaking and singing voices due to her strong Polish accent. Her speaking parts were done by Valentina Talyzina (who also did a bit role of one of Nadya's friends), and her singing is by the Grand Dame of the Soviet and Russian pop music, Alla Pugacheva, in the mid-Seventies still a relative nobody.
• James McAvoy's songs in Bollywood Queen were overdubbed with someone else.
• Except for Bobby Van, James Shigeta, and (bizarrely) Sally Kellerman, the entire main cast of the disastrous 1974 musical version of Lost Horizon was dubbed.
• Jennifer Lopez of course is a talented singer but she starred in Selena expecting to do her own singing. And since the film was so close to the real Selena's death, they felt audiences would prefer to hear Selena's real voice while Jennifer just lip-synched.
• In Joe's Apartment Ralph Roach the leader of the cockroaches was voiced by Billy West, his singing voice was done by Kelvin Mercer of the rap group De La Soul.
• In John Waters' 1990 film Cry-Baby, all of the characters' singing voices were done by professional singers, including Rachel Sweet, who did Allison's (played by Amy Locane) singing. Johnny Depp, who is a musician and has later proven himself, did not sing in this film (James Intveld was Cry-Baby's singing voice).
• In Joyeux Noël, set during the Christmas truce of World War I, German soldier Nikolaus Sprink (Benno Fürmann) and his lover Anna Sørensen (Diane Kruger) are both opera singers, and during their performance scenes, the singing voices of Natalie Dessay and Rolando Villazón are dubbed in.
• Natalya Varley in Leonid Gaidai's Kidnapping, Caucasian Style was not only dubbed for her singing voice by Aida Vedischeva, a famous pop singer of the time, but also her speaking parts were overdubbed by another actress, Nadezhda Rumyantseva, because Gaidai though that Varley's natural voice didn't fit the character.
• The early Made-for-TV Movie Freeze Frame dubbed its male lead (Kids Incorporated alum Ryan Lambert) in order to save money.
• The film version of Li'l Abner had the singing voice of Leslie Parrish (not from the original Broadway cast, unlike other principal actors) dubbed by Imogene Lynn.
• Played with in Love Actually, it is in fact Olivia Olson singing "All I Want for Christmas Is You", but her singing was toned down in post production because some people wouldn't believe it was actually a child singing.
• Most every film role that Lucille Ball did before television. After becoming a TV star, she used her own not-quite-singing voice for Mame (and the unsuccessful Broadway musical Wildcat which she starred in and co-produced).
• Similarly Marion Cotillard just lip-synched in La Vie en Rose when she played Edith Piaf - with the real Piaf's vocals playing.
• Mark Wahlberg's singing was dubbed in Rock Star by two metal vocalists, even though he had a musician career (which the film even lampoons in the credits...).
• The Mask:
  • The song that Cameron Diaz's character sings is actually dubbed over by Susan Boyd. Diaz has never been noted for her wonderful singing voice, as My Best Friend's Wedding and the 2014 film version of Annie have demonstrated.
  • Krista Buonauro plays the Lady Cop featured in the Cuban Pete number, but her singing was done by Angie Jaree.
• Miss Congeniality: Miss California performs a classical operatic aria for the talent segment of the Miss United States pageant. Wendy Racquel Robinson, who plays Miss California, mimed to a recording of a professional opera singer rather than attempt the aria herself.
• In Moulin Rouge!, Jim Broadbent's singing voice in the operatic numbers is dubbed in by Anthony Weigh.
• In O Brother, Where Art Thou?, George Clooney's character Everett's singing voice was dubbed by Dan Tyminski of Alison Krauss & Union Station.
• The film version of Oliver! had the vocals of the title character (played by Mark Lester) sung by Kathe Green, who was the daughter of the musical director.
• In Paint Your Wagon, Jean Seberg's singing was dubbed by Anita Gordon. Clint Eastwood and Lee Marvin's singing voices infamously weren't dubbed. (This didn't keep Marvin from enjoying a UK #1 with "Wand'rin' Star".)
• In The Phantom of the Opera (2004), Margaret Preece sung Carlotta's songs instead of Minnie Driver (who is a talented singer and performed "Learn to Be Lonely" over the credits, but had no operatic training at all). Preece also cameos as the female member of the trio in the "Il Muto" scene.
• In The Poseidon Adventure, the Award-Bait Song "The Morning After" is sung by Carol Lynley's character Nonnie, but Lynley's voice is dubbed over by singer Renee Armand.
• Queen of the Damned was still in post production when the star Aaliyah tragically died in a plane crash. As she had not finished all the ADR dubbing beforehand, her brother Rashad filled in for her, with his voice pitched higher to sound more feminine.
• Rami Malek also went the lip-synch route to portray Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody. Malek did sing on set to provide a convincing physical performance but all of the vocals are either Freddie's or, in cases where there were no recordings of Freddie, provided by Canadian singer Marc Martel who had previously worked with Queen on a tribute project.
• In The Return of Captain Invincible, all the major actors were dubbed during the musical numbers except Christopher Lee and Alan Arkin
• Parodied in Robin Hood: Men in Tights, where the singing voices sound nothing like the speaking voices (notably Arthur Rubin dubbing Cary Elwes).
• Peter Hinwood who played Rocky in The Rocky Horror Picture Show couldn't sing, so his singing voice was dubbed by Australian singer, Trevor White.
• In Shredder Orpheus, Robert McGinley plays Orpheus normally, while Bill Rieflin does Orpheus's singing vocals.
• Singin' in the Rain: Debbie Reynolds had her singing voice dubbed over when her character, "Kathy," dubs "Lina" - Jean Hagen (Lina) for the speaking bits, and Betty Noyes for the songs "Would You" and "You Are My Lucky Star".
• In Sister Act, Wendy Makkena's character Sister Mary Robert's singing voice (the shy but cute nun) was dubbed by Andrea Robinson.
• The Sound of Music:
  • Christopher Plummer recorded every vocal to every song in the film. In post-production, he reviewed his tapes, decided that there was no way in hell he was good enough to sing opposite Julie Andrews, and gave permission for Bill Lee to dub him. The soundtrack's 2023 Super Deluxe Edition includes Plummer's renditions of three songs in the bonus features.
  • Kurt's high note in "So Long, Farewell" is actually sung by Liesl's little sister, Darleen Carr. According to Charmian's memoir Forever Liesl, Darleen and a few other children were hired to provide additional voices on the group numbers. All seven actors do sing every number, though. The only time additional voices are not used is the listless rendition of My Favorite Things at the beginning of Act II, just before Maria's voice joins theirs.
  • Margery MacKay provided the singing voice of Peggy Wood, who wasn't up to "Climb Evr'y Mountain". In fact, the reason the Reverend Mother is facing the window as the song begins was because Peggy Wood had trouble lip-syncing to the start of the song.
• Of the four leads in the 1958 film version of South Pacific, only Mitzi Gaynor got to use her own singing voice. Giorgio Tozzi, the bass who sang for Rossano Brazzi, is a name well known to opera buffs. Muriel Smith, who dubbed Juanita Hall as Bloody Mary^note Juanita Hall would get to do her own singing in Flower Drum Song., had played the part onstage in the London production. Stewpot's brief basso profundo solo in "There Is Nothing Like A Dame" was dubbed by Thurl Ravenscroft.
• In Starstruck, Sterling Knight sings only the film's theme; all of his other songs are dubbed as he wasn't cast until later in the production after the songs had already been recorded.
• Thank Your Lucky Stars:
  • Olivia de Havilland did not do her own singing.
  • There's a moment in the finale where Errol Flynn lip-synchs to a high tenor voice and lampshades it:
    Oh, that voice is so divine!
    I'm sorry it isn't mine.
• For That Thing You Do! the actors playing The Wonders learned to play their instruments and how to play the songs. It helped them bond as a band, which helped their performances to be convincing. However it is not them you hear in the movie, as the performances are dubbed.
• In the Tina Turner biopic What's Love Got to Do with It (1993), Angela Bassett's singing parts were dubbed by the real Tina, who re-recorded her classic songs for the film. Bassett admitted that she never was much of a singer, though she had no problem with the dance moves. However, a bit of Bassett's singing voice can be heard during the intro to "Proud Mary" (everything before "Left a good job in the city" is Bassett). A non-singing example is Vanessa Bell Calloway, who played Tina's friend Jackie who introduced her to Buddhism. Calloway was uncomfortable reciting the Buddhist chants due to her strong Christian beliefs, so she was allowed to silently mouth the words while the actual chanting was dubbed in later.
• In Tuff Turf, Morgan (James Spader) plays the piano and sings a romantic ballad, with the voice provided by Paul Carney.
• In Voyage of the Rock Aliens, Tom Nolan as ABCD lip synchs to Rhema's music, while Craig Sheffer's voice is provided by Mark Spiro.
• Weird: The Al Yankovic Story parodies this trope. All of Daniel Radcliffe’s singing in character as "Weird Al" Yankovic is dubbed over by Yankovic himself, with little effort deliberately made to hide the fact.
• In Whale Music, the lead character Desmond Howl is played by Maury Chaykin, who softly sings the song "Claire" to himself while writing it. But when he records the vocals for the final version of the song, the voice coming out of him is that of Tim Vesley of Music/Rheostatics, the band commissioned to write the songs for the film.
• In White Christmas, Vera-Ellen's singing voice was provided by one Trudy Stevens. For the duet song "Sisters," Rosemary Clooney sang both parts (for herself and Vera).
  • Most other movie musicals featuring Vera-Ellen had someone else do her singing voice; On the Town assigned her a mostly non-singing part. It's pretty well known that while Vera-Ellen was an amazing dancer, singing was something she simply could not do. Ironically, her White Christmas costar, Rosemary Clooney, a great singer, admitted that her dancing wasn't exactly her specialty.
• In Wild in the Streets, rock star Max Frost is played by Christopher Jones, but his singing voice is provided by Harley Hatcher.
• Zac Efron's singing lines in High School Musical are all sung by Drew Seeley. This is because Troy was written to be a Tenor Boy, but Efron's vocal range is a baritone. Averted in the sequels where he did his own singing. In the first film, his own voice can be heard at the start of "Breaking Free" and as he sings outside Gabriella's window.
• Brigitte Bardot's singing in Doctor at Sea was dubbed over by Jill Day.

Live-Action TV

• Willow has only a few lines in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Musical Episode for this reason, one of which was "I think this line's mostly filler."
  • In "Superstar" Jonathan's performance of "Serenade in Blue" is actually Danny Strong lip-synching to a recording by Brad Kane (who is best known for providing the singing voice of Aladdin and had also played a minor character in the previous season).
  • Veruca's performances in "Beer Bad" and "Wild At Heart" is also Paige Moss lip-synching to songs from real band T.H.C.
• Done in-universe on Friends when Phoebe is dubbed for the "Smelly Cat" music video. It's obvious to everyone but her.
• The Get Down uses a framing device of the adult Zeke performing a rap about his teenage years during a concert. The adult Zeke is played by Daveed Diggs with his voice dubbed over by Nas even though Diggs is a highly skilled rapper in his own right.
• Dawn Wells, who played Mary Ann in Gilligan's Island, couldn't even sing "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" along with the rest of the cast without ruining it, and couldn't sing a single note without being dubbed over. Her natural singing voice is used in one episode however, when Mary Ann believes that she's Ginger. It's what causes her to remember who she actually is, because the actual Ginger sings much better.
• Halle Berry won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for playing Dorothy Dandridge in Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, but Dorothy's singing was done by Wendi Williams.
• LazyTown: Matthías Matthíasson provides Sportacus' singing voice.
• One Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch features John Cleese as an archaeologist who randomly bursts into song. Cleese by his own admission is a terrible singer (he did sing "Eric the Half a Bee", but very little else), so his singing parts in the sketch were dubbed in by Terry Jones. In his pre-Python TV and radio shows Cleese sang "Rhubarb Tart" and "The Ferret Song", which must be heard to be believed. Oddly, his version of "My Way" in George of the Jungle is actually quite good.
• In Mozart in the Jungle, Monica Bellucci plays an Italian soprano, whose singing voice comes from Puerto Rican soprano Ana María Martínez (however, Bellucci does her own singing in Ville-Marie).
• In The Partridge Family, only David Cassidy and Shirley Jones actually sang. The others all lip synched to the Ron Hicklin Singers.
• Sabrina the Teenage Witch has a Season 7 episode where Sabrina, Morgan and Roxie take 'talent lozenges' to compete in a singing competition. The singing is dubbed by En Vogue, who sound nothing like the actresses, presumably to sell the artificiality of it. Ironically when Sabrina had previously done a similar thing back in Season 2 (this time with 'Bottled Talent'), it was Melissa Joan Hart singing.
• Similarly in the Musical Episode of Scrubs, Elliot only has only a few sung lines throughout the episode, even during her and JD's friendship song, due to Sarah Chalke's apparent inability to sing. This inability to sing is later worked into Elliot's character as a running gag in Season 8.
• In-universe in That's So Raven. An episode where Cory's band decides to get a new singer has Cory being so enchanted by the beauty of one girl that he picks her, despite the fact that she's Hollywood Tone-Deaf. Faced with the possibility of either telling her the truth and offending her, or letting her sing live and ruin the performance...the girl ends up getting cold feet on the day. So she just lip-synchs on stage while Cory's mother (who has a much better voice) sings behind the curtain.
• The North American dub of Tweenies utilized this trope. Like The Noddy Shop below, the voices were recorded in Canada and the songs were recorded in Nashville.
• The Twilight Zone (1985): In "The Once and Future King", the singing voice of Ronnie McDowell is dubbed in whenever Jeff Yagher sings a song as either Elvis Presley or the Elvis Impersonator Gary Pitkin.
• In "The Bitter Suite", the first Musical Episode of Xena: Warrior Princess, Renee O'Connor and Hudson Leick (Gabrielle and Callisto) sang with the respective voices of Susan Wood and Michelle Nicastro; Miss O'Connor subverted this in the second one ("Lyre Lyre, Hearts on Fire"), as she did sing here - along with Miss Wood and Susan Calloway!
• El Chavo del ocho: In the Brazilian dub, most of the characters had separate voice actors during the musical numbers, although some of them alternate between keeping the same voice actor or using a different one. The only exception is Chespirito's voice actor, who always remains the same.
  • During dialogue, Profesor Jirafales was voiced by Osmiro Campos (formerly Potiguara Lopes in the first few episodes dubbed) and Doña Florinda by Marta Volpiani. When the two of them sang together, Profesor Jirafales' vocals were provided by Mario Lúcio de Freitas in the classic 80s dubs and by Mauro Ramos in the 2012 dub of a previously undubbed episode ^note After Osmiro Campos passed away in 2015, Mauro Ramos even became the definitive new voice for the character, while Doña Florinda's voice was done by Sarah Regina - who, amusingly enough, is Mário Lúcio's wife in real life - and Márcia Coutinho.
  • In the song "A Jugar", Chilindrina is voiced by Valerie Firmo, rather than her regular voice actress at the time, Sandra Mara Azevedo. This is very noticeable because Valerie gives her a completely different voice, very high-pitched and squeaky.
  • Like with Jirafales, Ramón Valdés is also voiced by Mário Lúcio de Freitas during certain songs.

Music

• In Jeff Wayne's Rock Opera adaptation of The War of the Worlds, Richard Burton is the narrating voice of the Journalist, whereas Justin Hayward is the character's singing voice.
  • Also applies visually in the stage version, where they are portrayed as a floating head on screen and a live actor on stage, respectively.
• Milli Vanilli was an extremely popular, award-winning rap/pop group in the late 80s and early 90s that returned a Grammy after it was revealed that the people getting all the credit for the music were just models dancing and lipsynching to uncredited vocalists. They were the original Trope Namer for the acting version.
  • They're just the most (in)famous example; several dance-oriented pop groups rely on attractive stand-ins lipsynching to others' voices. A downplayed case is Olga de Souza of Corona, who isn't actually the voice in the first two albums, but did perform live (and still does, even if the real singer has showed up) and eventually became the one recording too.
  • The impreassario behind Milli Vanilli, Frank Farian, made a career out of forming groups like this. Popular '70s Disco act Boney M. was fronted by Bobby Farrell, who contributed not one word of vocals to any of the studio tracks the group recorded; in fact it was Farian himself who performed the male vocals on all their songs.
• Probably the second most famous case after Milli Vanilli was the story of Martha Wash. A very talented but rather large woman, she recorded vocals for several famous songs in the early Nineties, mostly for dance groups such as Black Box and C+C Music Factory (That famous "EVERYBODY DANCE NOW!" at the beginning of "Gonna Make You Sweat"? That was her). Unfortunately, someone decided that because of her size, she was unmarketable, and was replaced by a model lip-synching the song in the video, without her knowledge or her permission. She took the record label to court, demanding proper credit and royalties, and there is now a mandate that all performers are given proper credit on recordings.
  • That model, Zelma Davis, was actually a vocalist herself, and sang on many of the tracks off C+C's album, Gonna Make You Sweat.
  • Martha Wash did get some modicum of fame in her own right in the mid-80s as one half of The Weather Girls, best known for their iconic One-Hit Wonder "It's Raining Men".
• Belgian house band/One-Man Band Technotronic recorded their hit debut album Pump Up the Jam: The Album with rappers Ya Kid K and MC Eric providing vocals in the studio, but used Congolese supermodel Felly to lip-sync Ya Kid K's rapping in the music video to the hit title track. A small controversy ensued, and Ya Kid K was featured in the band's followup videos.

Pinball

• Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! (2023): Captain Cutler Multiball features an original song performed entirely by Scott Innes. Among the many characters he voices in it are Shaggy and Scooby, who are otherwise played by Matthew Lillard and Frank Welker (respectively).

Professional Wrestling

• Wrestlicious had a character of an Idol Singer 'Kandi Kisses', played by Lizzy Valentine. At one point in the first episode, she has a skit where she performs a song "Powerbomb" in the ring (and is revealed to be lipsynching). Lizzy confirmed that the girl singing is not her.

Puppet Shows

• The Noddy Shop uses Nashville talent for the singing voices of the puppet characters. For instance, Joseph Wooten of the Steve Miller Band voices the lead Do-Wop Penguin. This is justifed, as the show was produced in Canada and the songs were written and recorded in Nashville.
• When the Anything People are introduced in the first episode of Sesame Street, they are all voiced by their performers, but when they start singing "Consider Yourself", some of their voices are sung by members of the human cast. Also happens in the rare performance of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds". The lead-singing girl is voiced by Loretta Long (Susan), but after the song ends, her voice is done by Frank Oz. Almost an opposite of the trope, as her singing is a lot more prominent.

Radio

• The Hamish and Dougal episode "Fame Idol", which hinges on Mrs Naughtie (played by Alison Steadman) having a beautiful singing voice (played by Jane Gilchrist). The series running on Rule of Funny, there was inevitably one scene where Mrs Naughtie sang in her own voice, for no reason whatsoever.

Theater

• Naturally, being a live medium and all, this doesn't happen in theater very often, even with actors and actresses whose singing voices have usually been dubbed by others in film; any songs they really can't sing are usually simply cut or reassigned to other characters. Occasionally, however, it can be used as a gag. For instance, A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder has the song "Lady Hyacinth Abroad", which ends with Lady Hyacinth (originated on Broadway by Jefferson Mays, who also played the other D'Ysquiths, male and female) hitting a crazy high note, usually provided by a female singer backstage.
• The revival of Spring Awakening, because of its casting Deaf and hard-of-hearing actors in some roles, has two actors playing said roles, one signing in American Sign Language and one speaking/singing (cast list for the Broadway iteration):
  • Sandra Mae Frank (sign) and Katie Boeck (voice) - Wendla
  • Daniel Durant (sign) and Alex Boniello (voice) - Moritz
  • Miles Barbee (sign) and Sean Grandillo (voice) - Otto
  • Joshua Castille (sign) and Daniel David Stewart (voice) - Ernst
  • Treshelle Edmond (sign) and Kathryn Gallagher (voice) - Martha
  • Amelia Hensley (sign) and Lauren Luiz (voice) - Thea
  • The roles of the Adult Women and Adult Men are unique: Camryn Manheim and Patrick Page speak and sign their lines, but also dub for Marlee Matlin and Russell Harvard whenever the latter two are onstage.
• When the aforementioned Joshua Castille played Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, EJ Cardona, who also played one of the Gargoyles, performed Quasi's Inner Monologue singing voice.

Video Games

• In Ape Escape 3, Pink Monkey is voiced by Debi Derryberry (speaking voice), and Anndi McAfee (singing voice).
• Cyberpunk 2077: Rockerboy Johnny Silverhand is voiced and played by Keanu Reeves, but his singing voice is done by the vocalist of the hardcore punk band Refused, Dennis Lyxzén. His bandmate, Kerry Eurodyne, is voiced by Matthew Yang King, but his singing voice is done by a Polish singer Damian Ukeje.
• Dragon Age: Origins has Leliana burst into song. Not only does she sound absolutely nothing like her speech voice actress, for bonus points she also looks like an utter freak of nature while doing so.
  • Possibly justified in-universe: Inon Zur's orchestra starts playing to accompany her, and based on her remarks afterwards, that's not what she actually sounded like, but the way she remembered "In Uthenera" being performed.
• A constant of the Ar tonelico series. Every singer in the series will have both a voice actress and a singing voice, with Akiko Shikata and Haruka Shimotsuki usually providing for the main heroines even though all of them have different voice actors. It gets even more obvious in the English dubs, that just use the Japanese songs with no change.
• Bruce Isaac's singing voice in Fallout: New Vegas is done by the project director and lead designer, Joshua Sawyer.
• While No Promises to Keep is sung by Aerith during Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, her singing voice isn't done by Briana White (or Maaya Sakamoto in the Japanese version) but through Loren Allred.
• Final Fantasy X-2:
  • Yuna's speaking voice is Hedy Burress but when she uses the Songstress dressphere to sing the songs "Real Emotion" and "1000 Words", the singing is done by Jade Villalon of Sweetbox. But when Yuna sings in battle, it's Hedy's own singing. Likewise with Tara Strong and Gwendoline Yeo when Rikku and Paine use songstress commands in battle.
  • Lenne, whose imprints are in the Songstress dressphere, also has her singing done by Jade Villalon - while Cree Summer is her speaking voice^note Cree Summer is in fact quite a gifted singer and has released an album, as well as singing in other roles.. This appears to imply that Yuna sings with Lenne's voice while using the dressphere - which is the case in the original Japanese, where Koda Kumi sang for both Yuna and Lenne.
• Fire Emblem:
  • Fire Emblem Fates zigzags the trope around a bit; The songstress Azura is voiced by voice actress Lynn for her speaking lines and up-and-coming singer Renka for her songs, with the latter providing the vocals to the game's vocal theme, if ~ hitori omou ("If ~ One's Thoughts"). The English dub, however, has Broadway actress Rena Strober do both her speaking and singing lines, with her version of the main theme (renamed "Lost in Thoughts, All Alone") being very well-received.
  • Fire Emblem Heroes: Fjorm is normally voiced by Heather Hogan-Watson for her appearances. For a supplemental music video in which she sang, Cristina Valenzuela provided the voice instead.
• Goodbye Volcano High: Fang is voiced by Lachlan Watson, while Brigitte Naggar of Common Holly provides their singing voice.
• Hades:
  • Orpheus is voiced by Michael Ailshie, while Darren Korb provides his singing voice. While Korb is himself a skilled voice actor, he had already been picked to voice main character Zagreus (who interacts with Orpheus frequently).
  • Euridyce is voiced by Francesca Hogan, with her singing voice produced by Ashley Barret.
• In the Davidson game Kid Phonics 2, all of the Sound Busters have different voice actors during the musical numbers.
• In LocoRoco, yellow and green one both have different voice actors - one for singing, other for talking.
• In Lunar: The Silver Star, Luna's English voice actress was Rhonda Gibson in the Working Designs era and Kathryn Kirk more recently, but Jenny Stigile provides Luna's singing voice in all the remakes.
• In Pajama Sam 4, the singing voice for the dirty sock was provided by composer Nathan Rosenberg.
• Red Dead Redemption II: Uncle is credited twice because of this; his original actor, John O'Creagh, died during the game's production, and while James McBride recorded over all of his lines, Rockstar preferred O'Creagh's singing and kept it in the game.
• Similar to the above example, in Tales of the Abyss Tear's (Nicole Karrer) fonic hymns are treated as sound effects, and use the original audio (Yukana).

Web Original

• The Nostalgia Critic did an episode on why this trope is neither a good OR bad thing.
• The Edutainment series Bossfight has Liana K playing multiple roles. But when it's time for SJW to sing, the vocals are provided by Maus Merryjest. Liana however does the singing for Princess Sparklemuffin and Ann Rearden.
• The "Powered by the Cheat" versions of the Homestar Runner characters. Their speaking voices are provided by Mike Chapman, but their singing voices are provided by Matt Chapman (or Missy Palmer in the case of Marzipan); in other words, the same as their normal versions. In this case, the conceit seems to be that the Cheat is making music videos for already-recorded songs, but doing his own voice acting when he makes regular cartoons or adds spoken intros.
• Vibha Meikote does Soap's singing voice in Inanimate Insanity II. Kacie Chapman does her speaking voice.
• In RWBY, Weiss Schnee is voiced by Kara Eberle, but her singing is done by Casey Lee Williams, who provides most of the show's soundtrack.
• In the Scott The Woz episode, "The Commercial Failure", Scott along with three of his friends, Terry Lesler, Jeb Jab, and Jerry Attricks (portrayed by Joe Robertson, Sam Essig, and Justin Womble respectively), performed a song called "Just Buy The Game". While Scott provided his own singing voice, the other three had their singing voices done by Kara Tualatai Davenport, Garrett Williamson, and Seth Williamson. And the end of each verse, Jerry has a solo line with each line having a different singer providing his voice, with Emma Rose Williamson doing the first one, Debi Shelby doing the second, and Aimee Joy Weimer doing the third and final. Ironically, all three of these singers give Jerry a feminine voice despite him normally having a masculine one while talking.
• In the Two More Eggs music video "Why Did You Take My Paste", the gopher, whose speaking voice was and still is Mike Chapman, is clearly played by Matt when he's singing.

Western Animation

• In The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius, the TV Movie "Win, Lose, and Kaboom" had the villain Meldar voiced by Tim Allen, with Jess Harnell voicing the character during his musical number.
• In the Italian dub of The Amazing World of Gumball, multiple cases happen:
  • Gumball's speaking voice was Federico Bebi until the first half of season 3 and then was replaced with Alessio Puccio. The singing voice was initially Leonardo Caneva, but towards the end of season 2 the part was taken by Mirko Fabbreschi, who kept the role until the end of the show.
  • Darwin was initially voiced by Andrea Di Maggio, who did his own singing. After his voice started to crack due to puberty, the singing parts were taken by Mirko Fabbreschi (yes, the same singing voice as Gumball). Halfway through season 3 Darwin was recast with Maura Cenciarelli, who did her own singing.
  • An early episode has Mr. Robinson, usually voiced by Alberto Caneva, being voiced by the late Danilo De Girolamo when singing and dancing on stage.
  • Mr. Small is usually voiced by Ivan Andreani, but his singing voice is done by Davide Garbolino in the first season and by Mirko Fabbreschi (again) in the subsequent ones.
• Animaniacs:
  • A very strange version: Jess Harnell voice Wakko's speaking and normal singing, but Wakko's "belch symphony" was done by Maurice LaMarche.
  • In the episode "Woodstock Slappy", the speaking voice of the Roger Daltrey caricature is voiced by Jim Cummings; his singing voice, however, is provided by Rob Paulsen.
  • The revival has Gabriel Mann, Brock Baker, and Missi Hale fill in for Rob Paulsen, Jess Harnell, and Tress MacNielle in some of the songs.
• Cheryl in Archer is normally voiced by Judy Greer, but when she became a country singer in the Vice arc, her singing voice was provided by country singer Jessy Lynn Martens.
• In the Baby Blues, episode "World's Greatest Dad" the scantily clad big busted Birthday Lady's speaking voice was Kath Soucie and her singing voice by Elizabeth Daily.
• All five of The Backyardigans have separate voice actors for singing^note likely done because of the series' heavy focus on music.
  • Pablo's speaking voice is done by Zach Tyler Eisen (Season 1) and Jake Goldberg (Seasons 2-4), and his singing voice is done by Sean Curley^note Curley is the only singing voice to provide his voice to the entire series.
  • Tyrone's speaking voice is done by Reginald Davis Jr. (Season 1), Jordan Coleman (Seasons 2-3) and Chris Grant Jr. (Season 4), and his singing voice is done by Corwin Tuggles (Season 1), Leon Thomas III (Seasons 2-3)^note In Season 3, Damani Roberts occasionally appeared as an understudy, and Tyrel Jackson Williams (Season 4).
  • Uniqua's speaking voice is done by LaShawn Jefferies, and her singing voice is done by Jamia Nash (Seasons 1-3) and Avion Baker (Season 4).
  • Tasha's speaking voice is done by Naelee Rae (Seasons 1-2) and Gianna Bruzzese (Seasons 3-4), and her singing voice is done by Kristin Klabunde (Seasons 1-2) and Gabriella Malek (Seasons 3-4).
  • Austin's speaking voice is done by Jonah Bobo, and his singing voice is done by Thomas Sharkey (Seasons 1-3) and Nicholas Barasch (Season 4).
• Bob the Builder: In the Latin Spanish dub, Scoop is voiced by Ricardo Silva, who also sings the series' opening theme.
• The music video segments on ChalkZone initially had Robbyn Kirmsse do Penny's singing voice instead of Hynden Walch, but Walch eventually did Penny's singing as well.
• In the Danny Phantom episode "Fanning the Flames", the song sung by Ember was by a woman named Robbyn Kirmsse (who did Penny's singing voice in ChalkZone) while her main actress is Tara Strong. Strangely, this is the only incident of that happening. Ember sings another song in another episode which as far as anyone knows, Strong does. Kirmsse only does one episode and is never heard from again.
• A particularly weird example in the English version of the Donkey Kong Country cartoon, wherein DK has two completely different voices for speaking and singing (Richard Yearwood and Sterling Jarvis, respectively).
• On Duckman, the title character's son Charles was voiced by Dana Hill. In the episode "Role With It" during the musical number Elizabeth Daily did his singing voice, possibly due to Hill’s failing health; she would pass away a month after the episode aired.
• In the TV special Easter Fever, the villain Madame Egg was voiced by Jeri Craden, however her singing voice was provided by a man singing in falsetto.
• The Eggs:
  • Benedict's speaking voice was provided by Michael O'Reilly, while his singing voice was provided by John Koensgen.
  • Yolky's speaking voice was provided by Kate Hurman, however, Andrea Lees provides the singing voice for her.
  • Scramble's voice actor Terrence Scammell provides the speaking and singing voices for him, however in two songs "Groovy Yolky" and "Trapped in a Nest" from two respective episodes "Yolky Saves the Day" and "The Missing Egg", his singing voice was provided by John Koensgen, who also provided the singing voice for Benedict.
• Elinor Wonders Why: For the "A Wonderful Journey" movie, Tamara Freeman does Beatriz's speaking voice, while Nisa Gunduz does her singing voice.
• Evil Con Carne usually had Cod Commando voiced by series creator Maxwell Atoms, but the Musical Episode "The Pie Who Loved Me" has his singing voice done by Robert Picardo.
• In The Fairly OddParents! Musical Episode "School's Out! The Musical", the pixies, normally voiced by Ben Stein, had their singing voices done by rappers Methold Man and Redman.
  • In another episode, "Fairy Idol", Cosmo, normally voiced by Daran Norris, has his singing voice done by Diana DeGarmo, a female singer.
• The Family Guy episode "Don't Make Me Over" saw the Griffins forming a family band fronted by Meg. Trouble is, Meg's voice actress, Mila Kunis, can't sing (unlike Lacey Chabert, who originally voiced Meg - see Anastasia above), so they called in Tara Strong to perform Meg's song. In Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, Ali Hills does Meg's singing voice. Kunis actually sang a line in a Sound of Music parody in the episode "Mr. Saturday Knight". On the DVD commentary, she claims she sounds "like shit". She also sang as Meg in "Road to the North Pole" during the "All I Really Want for Christmas" Crowd Song.
• In Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, While Fat Albert is voiced by Bill Cosby, his singing voice is provided by Michael Gray. Neither voice sounds anything alike.
• In The Flintstones, Wilma and Betty both had several different singing voices. None of them sounded anything like their speaking voices.
  • While Fred was voiced by Alan Reed, the character's singing voice was provided by Henry Corden. After Reed's death in 1977 Corden would take over as his voice full-time.
• An interesting case occurs in Filly Funtasia: Singer Windy Wagner performs almost all songs in the show^note The only songs she did not perform happened in season 2, thanks to the show's notorious case of Development Hell, by an unidentified singer. Most songs in the show occur in the background, not being a direct focus for the scenes they happen in. The only exceptions have only been sung by the main character, Rose; Thus, Wagner is the non-singing voice for Rose, while all of her dialogue is performed by Kelly Coalson (in the English version).
  • This also happens in the Latin American Spanish dub, recorded in Venezuela. Rose's speaking voice there is Annelia Hernández, while Nástinka Chacón, her singing voice, also performs all other songs in the show.
• Zig-zagged all over the place in the Garfield specials. Lorenzo Music primarily voiced Garfield, and occasionally provided his singing voice as well (as he also was for Garfield and Friends). More often than not though, Lou Rawls, who also sang the opening numbers for each special, provided his singing voice instead. Sometimes both of them provided his singing voice for the same specials. For example, in "Garfield's Halloween Adventure, Music sings as Garfield for "What Should I Be", as well as a brief pirate song while later on Rawls sings as him for "I'm No Scaredy-Cat".
• In the Garfield and Friends episode “Next Door Nuisance” in which a song writer moves next door after Garfield has driven away the old neighbor with his eating habits, the guy won’t stop singing a song called “Keep on Singing” and it’s interrupting Garfield’s nap so he calls the police, one is a female office voiced by June Foray, when she is convinced to join in on the song her singing voice is done by Desiree Goyote, the voice of Nermal.
• Hey Arnold!:
  • Mr. Hyunh sings with an inexplicable country singing voice, done by none other than Randy Travis.
  • Arnold's second voice actor, Philip Van Dyke wasn't comfortable singing for "What's Opera, Arnold?" so they had Arnold's previous actor, Toran Caudell sing the lines for him.
• In the feature film Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!, Yogi's singing voice during the gondola scene is that of James Darren, which Boo-Boo lampshades during the song. His singing voice for all other songs in the film is by Bill Lee. Boo-Boo and Cindy also have different singing voices than their regular actors in the movie.
• Hilda: David is voiced by Oliver Nelson, but for his solo singing in "Chapter 8" his singing voice was provided by Ilan Galkoff.
• In Histeria! often times during the songs the kids singing voices were dubbed by adults like Loud Kiddington who's regular speaking voice was Cody Ruegger his singing voice was often done by Rob Paulsen when he wasn't singing in character, Charity Baazar who's regular speaking voice was Laraine Newman (who was already an adult) her singing voice was provided by song writer Julie Bernstein.
• Late Holly Hobbie and Friends specials from Fabulous Fashion Show onwards has this due to a Nicole Bouma taking over from Alyson Stoner. However, while Alyson Stoner does her own singing, Nicole Bouma was paired with Mariella Piluso (apparently related to the producer of the show- hence the rampant accusations of nepotism), and it wouldn't be a problem if the two hadn't sound so different that their voices hardly matched up.
• In the House of Mouse episode "The Three Caballeros", Panchito is voiced by Carlos Alazraqui; his singing voice was done by Rob Paulsen.
• In the Nelvana Easter Special The Jack Rabbit Story: Easter Fever, Jack and Madame Melegg's respective speaking voices are done by Garrett Morris and Jeri Craden, with John Sebastian doing both of their singing voices.
• When Janet Waldo voiced Alice in Alice in Wonderland or What's a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This?, Doris Drew provided the singing voice. Waldo and Drew sound nothing alike. Waldo herself is actually a very good singer as evidenced in some early radio performances, so why they felt the need to replace her at all remains a mystery.
• Jem and the Holograms had a tendency for separate speaking and singing voices for characters. Much of this can be explained by the fact that the voice recording was done in California, but the song recording was done in New York City and Atlanta (and this was in the 80s when recording long distance was somewhat difficult) so rather than fly the actors back and forth they just used seperate actors and singers.
  • Jem / Jerrica had a speaking voice provided by Samantha Newark, but a singing voice provided by Britta Philips. Ironically enough, Newark is a singer herself.
  • Pizzazz was voiced by Patricia Albrecht when speaking, and Ellen Bernfeld (aka disco singer Menage) when singing.
    • Ellen Bernfeld also did backing vocals for The Holograms and The Misfits, and was the singing voice of Roxy in her only solo song. Roxy's speaking voice actress was Bobbie Block.
  • Riot of The Stingers spoke with the voice of Townsend Coleman and sang with the voice of Gordon Grody (who went on to become Lady Gaga's voice coach).
    • The other two Stingers were also dubbed for singing. When speaking, Minx was Kath Soucie and Rapture was Ellen Gerstell. For singing, both of them were usually dubbed by Diva Grey, but for Rapture's two solo lines in the song "Destiny", she was dubbed by Vicki Sue Robinson, the disco singer of "Turn the Beat Around" fame!
  • When Kimber and Stormer sang a duet, they were dubbed over by Florence Warner and Lani Grover respectively, though Cathianne Blore and Susan Blu perform their speaking lines. Interestingly enough, their singing voices don't match their speaking voices at all.
• Josie and the Pussycats: Josie, Valerie and Melody are voiced by Janet Waldo, Barbara Pariot and Jackie Joseph, but their singing voices are done by Cathy Dougher, Patrice Holloway and Cherie Moor (the latter being better known as future Charlie's Angels star Cheryl Ladd).
• During the Unlimited seasons of Justice League, Bruce Timm wasn't happy with Kin Shriner's attempt at humming Green Arrow's theme in "To Another Shore", so he took a crack at it and it was animated to his voice, but Timm was still unhappy and during ADR, he had Lex Lang do it).
• Kim Possible: The Oh Boyz singing voices are not the same as their speaking voices.
• In an episode of King of the Hill, the singing voice of Boomhauer, whose regular speaking voice is by Mike Judge, was performed by country singer Vince Gill.
• Let's Go Luna!: While Judy Greer used to voice and sing for Luna, she was eventually replaced by Erin Fitzgerald for Luna's singing voice. And then Fitzgerald was permanently replaced by Liane de Lotbinière.
• In The Lion Guard, any time Simba (voiced by Rob Lowe for this series) has to sing, Jess Harnell has to be brought in for the task because Lowe presumably can't sing.
• On Littlest Pet Shop (2012), Penny Ling is voiced by Jocelyn Loewen, but her singing voice is Laura Hastings. Also, Zoe Trent is voiced by Nicole Oliver, with Kylee Epp as her singing voice. Oddly, the singing doubles have no other TV credits whatsoever.
• In "Really Loud Music", the Musical Episode of The Loud House, Lincoln's singing is done by Jackson Petty instead of his then-current voice actor, Collin Dean.
  • In the Italian dub, Jacopo Cioni replaces Alessio De Filippis as Lincoln's singing voice starting from "Write and Wrong".
• This is used for the songs in Magic Adventures of Mumfie, with different singers providing the singing voices for the characters rather than the narrator's voice singing the songs.
• In the Italian dub of Muppet Babies (1984), Pietro Ubaldi (Gonzo's voice actor) replaced THE ENTIRE CAST when singing.
• In My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic a lot of the characters get singing doubles: Rebecca Shoichet for Twilight Sparkle, Shannon Chan-Kent for Pinkie Pie, Kazumi Evans for Rarity, and Michelle Creber for Sweetie Belle until Season 4. (Amusingly, Michelle also provides the speaking and singing voices for Apple Bloom, which sometimes leads to Sweetie sounding inexplicably Southern when she sings.) Singing Luna was voiced by Kazumi Evans up until "A Hearth's Warming Tail", where Aloma Steele took over.
  • While Pinkie Pie's singing voice is normally provided by Shannon Chan-Kent, her speaking voice Andrea Libman still does her own singing as Fluttershy, and even Pinkie on occasion. According to Libman, this is because Pinkie's speaking voice can be very straining for her; one can only imagine doing the singing voice would be even harder on her vocal chords. Pinkie Pie's Smile Song notably has Libman providing backing vocals, making it a rare case where both singing and voice actors for Pinkie Pie are heard together. Andrea Libman also provided Pinkie Pie's rap in "Testing Testing 1, 2, 3".
  • In another odd case, Twilight Sparkle's speaking voice actress Tara Strong is more than capable of singing herself (she's even been the singing double to other actresses before), but her voice is recorded separately from other actors in the show; she's the only Hollywood-based actor while all the others record in Canada, and Strong is usually unavailable to travel. Strong does perform Twilight's first line in "At the Gala", but Rebecca Shoichet takes over for the rest of the song.
  • While afflicted with a deep male voice in "Filli Vanilli", Fluttershy has two different male actors for her speaking and singing parts.
  • Normally Scootaloo's speaking and singing is done by her regular VA, Madeline Peters, but her final two songs in Seasons 8 and 9 were done by Arielle Tuliao.
  • Ponytones member Torch Song's speaking voice is Cathy Weseluck, while her singing voice is Jerrica Santos, the singer of EQUESTRIA GIRLS' end credits song, "A Friend for Life".
  • In the Italian dub, almost everyone has a different voice actor for singing.
    • Rainbow Dash, normally voiced by Federica Valenti, when singing is voiced by Renata Bertolas in the first three seasons (except for "Suited By Success" and "May the Best Pet Win!", where Marisa Della Pasqua takes the role) and Rossella Contu from Season 4 onwards.
    • Applejack's regular voice is Benedetta Ponticelli, replaced by Renata Bertolas in the first season (except for her very first line in "Winter Wrap-Up", where Marisa Della Pasqua does the voice with Renata taking the role for her verse later in the song) and Maria Silvia Roli starting from Season 3.
    • Pinkie Pie, whose regular voice actress is Donatella Fanfani, has her singing done by Vera Calacoci in the first three seasons and Silvia Pinto starting from EQUESTRIA GIRLS.
    • Fluttershy, usually Benedetta Ponticelli, has Marisa Della Pasqua as her singing vocal chords (except in "May the Best Pet Win!" where Vera Calacoci takes her place)
    • Rarity, normally voiced by Camilla Gallo, gets replaced by Greta Bortolotti when singing, and is actually the only one of the Mane 6 with a fixed singing voice.
    • Twilight Sparkle's voice actress, Emanuela Pacotto, usually does her own singing, except for the ending credits song of Friendship Games and "The Cutie Remark", where Laura Panzeri takes her place.
    • Marisa Della Pasqua, Greta Bortolotti and Laura Panzeri take the singing roles for most of the other characters (including Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Starlight Glimmer, Countess Coloratura and Apple Bloom).
    • Sweetie Belle is usually voiced by Sabrina Bonfitto, but when singing she is replaced by Vera Calacoci in the first seasons (albeit Jasmine Laurenti took the role in "The Show Stoppers") and Marisa Della Pasqua from Season 4 onwards.
    • Scootaloo, normally voiced by Martina Felli, is replaced by Renata Bertolas up to Season 3 and Maria Silvia Roli from Season 4 onwards.
    • Discord is voiced by Mario Zucca, but his singing in "Three's a Crowd" was done by Riccardo Rovatti (Amusingly, Zucca and Rovatti are also known for voicing respectively Mr. Krabs and Plankton).
    • Big McIntosh is voiced by Mario Scarabelli in the first four seasons, Diego Baldoin in season 5 onwards and Jacopo Calatroni in the Equestria Girls films, but Luca Sandri does his humming in "Filli Vanilli".
    • The only characters whose voice actors always did their singing are Spike (Tania De Domenico), Princess Cadance and Trixie (both Marisa Della Pasqua), and Cheese Sandwich (Paolo De Santis).
• Monster High: Deuce was cast a different voice actor for his Break Up Song with Cleo, which came off as absurd to viewers because of how different he sounded. See here.
• In the Oh Yeah! Cartoons short "The Feelers", every single member of the titular rock band of anthropomorphic insects has separate voice actors for speaking and singing.
  • Mitzi Moth is voiced by Rosslynn Taylor, with her singing voice done by Robbyn Kirmsse.
  • Max is voiced by Joe Lala when speaking and by Bill Burnett when singing.
  • Mo Skito's spoken dialogue is done by Quinton Flynn, while his singing voice is provided by Joe Pizzulo.
  • Stinger's speaking voice is provided by Greg Eagles, with his singing voice done by Alvin Chea.
• Taken to the point of parody on Phineas and Ferb, where (British) Ferb will sing with completely different accents for reggae or rap songs. Most of the other characters sing with the voice actors' voices, however.
  • And an in-universe example from the same, during the "Summer Belongs to You" special, Phineas hires Clay Aiken for his voice for one musical number, and Ferb gets Chaka Khan. It is obviously lampshaded.
  • Also lampshaded with Linda, who admits that her "Lindana" career was done by lip-syncing. In real life, Linda is voiced by Caroline Rhea while "Lindana" is performed by Olivia Olson, who also voices (and sings for) Vanessa.
  • Stacy's voice is usually that of Kelly Hu, but her singing voice is that of Laura Dickinson, since Hu doesn't sing very well.
• In the P.J. Funnybunny special “P.J.'s Unfunnybunny Christmas“ P.J. was voiced by Troy Davidson, his singing voice was done by Elizabeth Daily.
• In the Italian dub of the The Powerpuff Girls (1998) episode "Mime for a Change", all three the Powerpuff Girls are voiced by Monica Ward (who usually voices only Blossom) when singing "Love Makes The World Go Round".
• Razzberry Jazzberry Jam: Billie was voiced by Nicole Stamp, but her singing was done by Jenna Andrews. The credits even list the latter as “Singing Billie”.
• Ready Jet Go!: In "Holidays in Boxwood Terrace", Mitchell's singing voice is performed by Meg Roe, who is also the voice of Celery.
• Recess:
  • Mikey's speaking voice is Jason Davis, but his singing voice is performed by Robert Goulet. A whole episode was dedicated to his newly discovered singing talent, and it's later revealed he can also speak in this voice when he uses it to spread a rumor. In this case, it's Played for Laughs, as his singing voice sounds absolutely nothing like his normal voice, being a ridiculously low, adult baritone. To quote a kindergartner in Recess: School's Out, after he sings his farewell to TJ, "Big kid sing good."
  • When the main six perform "Green Tambourine" for the film's end credits, the rest of the main six have different singing voices, with the sole exceptions of Vince (Ricky D'Shon Collins) and Spinelli (Pamela Segal). Interestingly enough, Gus (Courtland Mead) had his singing voice performed by Blake Ewing, the voice of Menlo, and Gretchen (Ashley Johnson) had hers by Anndi McAfee, the voice of Ashley A.
• Red Hot Riding Hood: Red's speaking voice was primarily done by Sara Berner while her singing voice was provided by Connie Russell. In her later appearances, Imogene Lynn provides her voice with the exclusion of Wild and Woolfy where her singing voice was done by Ann Pickard.
• In an episode of Rocko's Modern Life, Filburt discovers he has a talent for lounge singing. His regular speaking voice was done by Doug Lawrence and his singing voice by Tom Kenny (Heffer), who in addition to voice acting is also a professional singer.
• Rosie's Rules: Rosie has two voices; one for speaking (Ellora Lopez) and one for singing (Ana Sofia Ferrer).
• In Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: The Movie (1998), the villianess Stormella is voiced by Whoopi Goldberg while her singing voice is done by Carmen Twillie. Same goes for Rudolph, who was voiced by Kathleen Barr but has a male singing voice.
  • The 2001 sequel Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and the Island of Misfit Toys allows Barr to provide Rudolph's singing voice this time; however, the antagonist known as the Toy Taker is voiced by Rick Moranis for speaking, but not for singing.
• In Scooby-Doo! Music of the Vampire when the gang is singing at the beginning, that is obviously not Frank Welker doing Fred's singing voice, as the singer (Jim Wise) is much younger and sounds nothing like him. Also, Bets Malone fills in for Mindy Cohn as Velma's singing voice.
  • For Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire, Velma sings a solo song at the end of the feature, and it was obviously not Nicole Jaffe doing her own singing. It was Krystal Harris. The same appens in the Italian dub, with Renata Bertolas replacing Giulia Franzoso.
• From 2021, The Simpsons replaced Marge's singing voice with Kristen Bell due to Julie Kavner's voice becoming too old for singing.
• Sofia the First:
  • When Jasmine and Mulan visit our heroine, Linda Larkin and Ming-Na Wen are again subbed by Lea Salonga for the singing, as they were in their respective movies.
  • Also a plot point in the episode "The Silent Knight" where a heroic knight called Sir Bartleby never talks because of his horribly squeaky voice, which he sees as a barrier to telling Sofia's Aunt Tilly how he feels about her; so a plan is hatched for him to lipsync while another knight with a great singing voice sings for him. It doesn't work. But ultimately Tillie likes Sir Bartleby anyway, voice and all.
  • Clio and Hildegard are voiced by Harley Graham and Coco Grayson, while Jenna Lea Rosen does both of their singing.
  • In "Just One of the Princes", Prince Hugo was voiced by Colin Ford, (who was replaced by Grayson Hunter Goss for his later appearances), and his singing voice was provided by Aaron Daniel Jacob.
• Sonic Underground had the three hedgehog protagonists (yes, even the girl) voiced by the same voice actor, Jaleel White. However, when it came to the Once an Episode singing segment, they were voiced by three separate voice actors: Samuel Vincent for Sonic, Tyley Ross for Manic and Louise Vallance for Sonia. Sonic's and Sonia's were close enough matches, but Manic's singing voice sounded absolutely nothing like his normal one.
• Parodied in South Park in "A Very Crappy Christmas" with the song "The Circle of Poo" (a parody of The Lion King (1994)), with Mr. Hankey's son Cornwallis talking in a young child's voice (Trey Parker) but singing with a deep man's voice (former Temptations member Louis Price).
  • Played straight in "Elementary School Musical" for some of the other students. A few of the girls, particularly Bebe, were voiced by Molly Pasutti ^note a local LA singer and the wife of the show's composer Jamie Dunlap. She's also known for dubbing the opening theme of the anime "Moldiver for their singing parts. Pasutti's two children, Alexis and Dylan Dunlap, filled in for providing the vocals for the other boys and girls.
  • An interesting variation occurs in the episode "Wing". Token sings "You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine" by Lou Rawls, but since the actor couldn't sing they sped up the original song instead. The sped up version sounds just like Token so it's pretty subtle.
  • Big Gay Al, while usually voiced by Matt Stone, has his singing voice provided by Trey Parker in the movie.
  • Howard McGillin was also the singing voice for Gregory in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, whose speaking voice was Trey Parker.
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • While SpongeBob often sings in his normal voice, on special occasions he shows off a fantastic singing voice that sounds nothing like him, with him being voiced by a different guest singer every time.
  • In the episode "Christmas Who?", Mr. Krabs sings in falsetto at the end of the song, "The Very First Christmas". Clancy Brown tried to reach this point, but it was too hard for him to reach; Dee Bradley Baker, one of the recurring voice actors in the show, filled in for him.
• In the TV special The Story of Santa Claus, Santa is voiced by Ed Asner and his singing voice was done by Jim Cummings.
• In Strawberry Shortcake's Berry Bitty Adventures, Strawberry is voiced by Anna Cummer, but her songs are done by Tracey Moore.
  • Funnily enough, Shannon Chan-Kent, the singing voice for Pinkie Pie in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, voices Cherry Jam, a pop star, but her songs are done by Victoria Duffield.
    • In the succeeding series, Berry in the Big City, Shannon herself would be the singing voice for Raspberry Tart, while her speaking lines would be done by Tabitha St. Germain.
  • In Strawberry Shortcake: Berry in the Big City, Lime Chiffon is voiced by Margarita Valderrama, while her singing is done by Cassandra Consiglio.
• In Tak and the Power of Juju (2007), the character the Log Hermit is voiced by Maurice LaMarche, but his singing in "Our Favorite Juju" is done by Mani Baker.
• The Norwegian dub of Tiny Toon Adventures avoided this for the most part as almost all the characters has the same speaking/singing voices... except for Buster, whose voice actor apparently couldn't sing. As such, his singing voice was provided by the actor who voiced Gogo, Dizzy and Daffy, and sounded absolutely nothing like his speaking one.
• The T.U.F.F. Puppy episode "Monkey Business" features a boy band called the Hunky Monkeys. The individual members Bingo, Bango and Robespierre's respective speaking voices are Jerry Trainor, Rob Paulsen and Maddie Taylor, with Brock Baker, Tim Davis and Luke Edgemon doing their singing voices.
• VeggieTales:
  • In "Esther: The Girl Who Became Queen", Queen Esther is voiced by Jessica Kaplan, with her singing voice by Pamela Thomas.
  • In "Princess and the Pop Star", Vanna Banana's speaking voice is provided by Rebecca Walker while her singing was provided by Moriah Peters.
  • In the compilation release "God Loves You Very Much", Annie is voiced by Maggie Roberts (who began voicing her in "The Little Drummer Boy"), while her singing was provided by Ally Nawrocki (who'd previously voiced the character starting with "Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Samson's Hairbrush" through "Sweetpea Beauty"). By the time "Merry Larry and the True Light of Christmas" came out about two years later, Maggie was capable of providing her own singing.
• In Wishenpoof, Bianca is voiced by Addison Holley, but her singing is done by Hope Cassandra.
• In the Woody Woodpecker cartoons "The Barber of Seville" and "Ski for Two", Woody's singing voice was provided by Lee Sweetland, a popular singer of the time, whereas his speaking voice was done by Ben Hardaway. One can hardly tell the difference as the voice is sped up to sound like Woody's.
  • Well, sorta. One second, Woody's line sound very stiff (it sounds like Hardaway has to sound out every word), then BOOM! Operatic tenor!

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