I seem to remember, way back, answering that point also when first raised, with a reference to the necessity for empathy — it's, after all, what actors do all the time: otherwise how could any of them play Hamlet or Macbeth, for instance? One has to be some sort of actor when singing, esp a narrative like a ballad — & actors have all sorts of techniques from the melodramatic to the deadpan-throwaway — just as have ballad-singers [cf refs to ShirleyCollins/EMacC above].