Meanings
plural slåtts · plural slåtter
- entertainmentA Norwegian style of folk music or dance, or a piece of such.
There is also a corresponding ambiguous use of the term slått or fiddle tune. I will use the term slatt both as a designation of the genre, and in the sense when used in a sentence like ”Skårsvikjen is a nice slått”.
2007 [1988], Tellef Kvifte, On Variability in the Performance of Hardingfele Tunes - and Paradigms in Ethnomusicological Research, Taragot Sounds, →ISBN, page 463 more examples
the name of "a gorrlaus slått". And though the players themselves fully acknowledge the fact that the formal structure of Norafjells may differ, even widely, from player to player, or even from one playing to another by the same player, yet it is the same "slått" and recognized as such. So in spite of its variability, "the slått" has an identity, and the subject of the present dissertation is four or five "slåtts" – no more.
1989, Morten Levy, The World of the Gorrlaus Slåtts: A Morphological Investigation of a Branch of Norwegian Fiddle Music TraditionBull’s very personal style of violin playing, a result of professional studies and the slåtter folk music influence of the peasant Hardanger fiddlers living in the Bergen countryside, attracted critical praise everywhere he performed.[…]Gangar: “Walking dance.” A type of Norwegian slått in duple or compound meter. Halling: Also known as lausdans. A type of Norwegian slått in duple or compound meter. Hardingfele: “Hardanger fiddle.” A traditional Norwegian folk instrument, resembling a violin, with four bowed strings and four sympathetic strings. The traditional music of the hardingfele is the slått.
2002 June 30, Frederick K. Smith, Nordic Art Music: From the Middle Ages to the Third Millennium, Bloomsbury Publishing USA, →ISBN, pages 39, 155He thought it was a slått he must have heard in Rauland, and couldn't get out of his head. It was so memorable that when he came home to Dahle he played the slått at once. It was probably neither Huldra or Nøkken, but simply Knut Dahle's own creative mind playing a trick on him. The new slått was wonderful, sometimes wild and unruly, other times soft and sensitive. When Knut first played this slått he thought it was one he had heard from Gibøen or Myllarguten[…]
2017 June 7, Ian J Brodie, Rjukan: A UNESCO World Heritage Site, On Location Guides, page 22
Origin
- Norwegianslått
- Englishslått
Unadapted borrowing from Norwegian slått.
More words from Norwegian
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
slått. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sl%C3%A5tt
“slått.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sl%C3%A5tt. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “slått,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sl%C3%A5tt.
Source: slått on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.