Christmas Distilled: How Lindsey Stirling’s pop-violin LP ‘Snow Waltz’ is the humbug antidote

As I write this I’m still reeling from finding out that there are only four Mondays left until Christmas. Despite the chilly weather and the Christmas songs which are slowly seeping their way onto the radio – to me, the holiday season still seems far away.

However, this is not the case for pop-violinist Lindsey Stirling. When we speak she’s just finishing up a  mini-tour of the UK which was spent promoting her new Christmas LP, ‘Snow Waltz’, so safe to say the holidays have been on her mind for a while.

And she’s not alone. “People showed up in Christmas sweaters,” she tells me excitedly over Zoom as we discuss the audience at her run of intimate shows. “Any excuse to dive in early!” she says laughing.

And it wasn’t just the fashion that was Christmas-themed. “I got to do a Q and A with the audience,” she explains. “I asked people what their favourite holiday snack was and they all shouted back at once. We couldn’t understand them! It turns out they were saying ‘Mince Pies’, but for ages, my guitarist and I were looking at each other mouthing, ‘Mint pie??’”

Eventually, the right words must have gotten around however, as for the rest of the performances fans came armed with mince pies for Lindsey and her team to try. I asked her what she thought of the very English treat. “It’s kind of like a really heavy fig newton,” she tells me laughing.

In fact, Lindsey has been thinking about the holiday season long before early November – it’s actually been a recurring theme since she started working on her new LP –  an incredible mix of holiday-themed originals and cover songs she released earlier this month.

From the flamenco-inspired ‘Feliz Navidad’ to the beat-heavy ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ it’s clear that this is no ordinary Christmas album. I asked Lindsey how she chose the covers she wanted to include.

“It was all about finding original arrangements,” she tells me. “One of my favourite hymns is ‘Joy to the World’ and I realised no one no one had done it in a Celtic style and I figured they matched well, so it was a big spiral of experimentation!”

Conversely, Lindsey also picked to cover ‘Little Drummer Boy’ because it’s her least favourite Christmas song. “So many people love that song, but I don’t care for it,” she explains. “So in a way, I did it for the challenge. On top of that, I realised that no one has really given the drums in that song the proper time. So, I made a version that just lets the drummer boy really go for it and play.”

My personal favourite on the LP is the eponymous ‘Snow Waltz’. Enchanting and whimsical, Lindsey has managed to marry the magic of two holidays, Christmas and Halloween. The video provides the ultimate accompaniment, dancers dressed in amazing skeleton costumes wander the ‘Holiday Halls’ exploring themes we have so long accepted as part of Christmas; they no longer seem strange or scary to us, like Santa breaking into your house to bring you presents.

“I felt the pizzicato [plucking a string instrument] sounded like bones clacking together”, she tells me as she describes how she came up with the concept of the video. “I also just really wanted to be silly with it.”

Lindsey takes on a very active role when it comes to creating her music videos – not only does she make all the costumes herself, but her experience in film school means she is a major part of the storytelling process. I ask her if her number of different creative pursuits ever inform one another.

“I’m really grateful that I have all these different ways of storytelling”, she tells me. “When I’m writing music I’m also thinking about the music video – or thinking about what kind of moment this particular piece of music will create in my live shows. I’ve experienced the cycle so many times now – write music, make music videos, and then go on tour – that the creative process for each all sort of blends into each other. It’s great because if I’m feeling writer’s block in any medium it allows me to go and shake it off in another way”.

Despite igniting the Christmas spirit for so many of her listeners, Lindsey’s own holiday season won’t be very traditional this year as she’ll be touring with her crew. Although this is not to say Christmas will go uncelebrated. “We have our own little traditions,” she explains. “We do secret Santa, and I’m arranging a stocking scavenger hunt. It’s such a joyful time, the people on my tour are a family to me, we always joke and say we all ran away together to join the ‘Lindsey Tour Circus’.”

Christmas was always a big deal to Lindsey’s family growing up. “We were poor year round but on Christmas we were rich”, she jokes. “My mum would save up her pennies and make these magical Christmases for us, we would also make sure we engaged in some kind of charitable act or service. That’s probably why I love sharing Christmas so much.”

This charitable facet of Christmas is something that has followed Lindsey into adulthood with the establishment of the Upside Fund, a scheme which allows Lindsey to pay off her fan’s medical bills.

“I started it on a whim”, she says. “Several years ago I spent Christmas in the hospital with my dad. It’s the hardest place to be on Christmas when everyone else is posting happy pictures with their loved ones and you’re going through one of the hardest experiences you’ll ever have. That first Christmas after my dad passed I was just missing him alot and I kept thinking about that Christmas in the hospital. I thought that if anyone else is going through something similar I wanted to help them – and that’s how it started. Last year it was amazing, we were actually able to buy over a million dollars worth of medical debt – it’s something near and dear in my heart.”

We hang up the Zoom call both of our eyes a little misty. Now, recalling our conversation and expressing Lindsey’s deep emotional relationship with the holiday, it’s hard not to feel some Christmas spirit. In fact, as I listen to the expertly and imaginatively crafted Christmas covers on ‘Snow Waltz’ maybe four Mondays is actually far too far away.