PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION NOTES

This is not a normal standard transcription but specifically the reflection of Sheeran's pronunciation in this song.

- T -: To better express the peculiarities of Sheeran's pronunciation here (British English) we will use three symbols to transcribe his pronunciation of the sound /t/: /t/ (pronounced with the tip of the tongue) /D/ (the quick flap similar to the Spanish or Italian R in "cara") and /ʔ/ (gutural sound pronounced in your throat by suddenly closing the air flow). /D/ is also a common pronunciation of /t/ and /d/ when they go between vowels (it's in fact a very quick /d/ sound).

- /ʔ/-: This sound is, as we've seen, a variation of /t/, but it also appears sometimes as the beginning of a vowel which is starting a new word or beginning a sentence. It is used to make it stronger. In that case it has no meaning (it's nothing, really, just a way of articulation), but it has an importan phonetic consequence since it prevents the linking sounds. For example, if we say "for us", the normal pronunciation in British English would be /fər ʌs/, but if we use this glottal stop /ʔ/ then sounds don't link and we say /fə ʔʌs/, because in BrE we only pronounce the R when followed by a vowel, and this /ʔ/ behaves like a consonant, so the /r/ disappears.    

- R -: in British English the R is often silent but is pronounced when followed by a vowel, so "your eyes" should be /jɔ:r aɪz/ (or usually /jər aɪz/with the usual weakening of grammar words). But for example in the 4th line here you can hear /jə aɪz/. So what's wrong? In English (as in most languages), if a word starts with a vowel you can begin the pronunciation of that vowel with a kind of "strong push" in your throat. That "push" means you close the air flow for an instant, which is what we do with the consonant T in its gutural variant /ʔ/, so the actual pronunciation is /jə ʔaɪz/. That means that between the vocalic sounds /ə - a/ we have a consonant like sound /ʔ/, so there is no need of a linking R because the letter R is not then followed by a vowel, almost as if the spelling of this were "your tais" and not "your eyes". Of course the most usual pronunciation in normal speech would always be /jər aɪz/, since in English we don't usually use the vocalic gutural stop in vowels inside a sentence (but it is not uncommon in a vowel which begins a sentence).

- I -: When the vowel /ɪ/ goes at the end of a word two pronunciations are possible in both British and American English. We can pronounce it /ɪ/ or /i:/. For example the word "seventy" is transcribed /sevənti:/, but it is also perfectly correct to pronounce it /sevənti:/ as we see in line 5 here.

- O -: The standard British pronunciation of the diphthong O is /əʊ/, but Sheeran is from the north, and though he speaks perfect standard here, he uses the normal northern variant of this diphthong which is (like in American English) /oʊ/ or /ɒʊ/.

- grammar words -: Prepositions, conjunctions, pronouns, etc. are often weakend in normal conversation, but the rhythm of the music sometimes forces to stress one of this words and so they retain their "strong pronunciation". For example YOUR has a strong pronunciation /jɔ:/ and a weak pronunciation /jə/, which is the one we use inside a sentence in normal conversation, but in this song sometimes he uses the strong form because the rhythm makes him pronounce it emphatically, as if it were alone.