songstress

plural songstresses

1. A female singer.

   The songstress paused, and was answered by one or two deep and hollow groans, that seemed to proceed from the very agony of the mortal strife.

   1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], →OCLC

   3 more examples

   At every pause in the music she gracefully waved her flower-basket round, inviting the loiterers to buy; and many a sesterce was showered into the basket, either in compliment to the music or in compassion to the songstress—for she was blind.

   1834, [Edward Bulwer-Lytton], chapter II, in The Last Days of Pompeii. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […]; successor to Henry Colburn, →OCLC

   Were I to reproduce the nine other paragraphs, it would be a very curious, instructive, and tedious specimen of literature; and, who knows? I might corrupt some immaculate soul, inspire some actor or actress, singer or songstress, with an itch for public self-laudation, a foible from which they are all at present so free. Witness the Era, the Hornet, and Figaro.

   1877, Charles Reade, A Woman-Hater

   Sally Yeh is the winsome and amiable character known as Stool, who’s living next door to the ambitious and tetchy songstress Shu-Shu, who’s both commanding and funny as portrayed by Sylvia Chang.

   2025 June 19, Glenn Kenny, “‘Shanghai Blues’ Review: Slapstick Fun in a 1984 Tsui Hark Picture”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

   Synonyms: cantrix, chanteuse, chantress, singeress

2. A female songbird.