screlt

English

Etymology

Blend of scream +‎ belt.

Verb

screlt (third-person singular simple present screlts, present participle screlting, simple past and past participle screlted)

1. To sing (something, especially high notes in musical theater) in a particular forceful way that combines screaming and belting.
   • 2019 June 28, Marci Rosenberg, Wendy D. LeBorgne, The Vocal Athlete: Application and Technique for the Hybrid Singer, Second Edition, Plural Publishing, →ISBN, page 152:

     ... screaming into the mike and you should not be screaming either. You should be turning up the heat on your emotions which creates power in your voice. It is very different from belting, “screlting,” or screaming. Think of it like a […]

   • 2022 March 13, David Sisco, Laura Josepher, Performing in Contemporary Musicals, Routledge, →ISBN:

     ... screlting (scream-belting) high notes over a loud pop / rock - based pit band may come to mind . But contemporary musical theatre covers so many different musical idioms and requires tremendous vocal dexterity . There is not one […]

   • 2025 February 20, Siobhan Thompson (@vornietom.bsky.social‬), on Bluesky:

     Just feel like Chuck Schumer might get something done if the alternative was listening to 40 lightly pitchy people screlting Legally Blonde outside his office all day.

Noun

screlt (plural screlts)

1. An instance of singing in this way.
   • 2022 October 4, Gideon Glick, Adam D. Roberts, Give My Swiss Chards to Broadway: The Broadway Lover's Cookbook, The Countryman Press, →ISBN:

     One note away from danger. Sort of like the last screlt in "Defying Gravity."

   • 2023 October 27, Amanda Wansa Morgan, Conversations with Women in Musical Theatre Leadership, Taylor & Francis, →ISBN, page 2011:

     [Anderson-Lopez:] I have a pretty big [singing] range and over the years I've learned to take my mix pretty high, so that's perhaps why we can be known to let the emotion of a song lead to some serious "screlts.". We're trying to get a little more mindful around voice parts in our most recent project. We were trying to write a little less rangy.