The Catalyst interview: Lindsey Stirling

According to YouTube, Lindsey Stirling’s channel has 14.1 million subscribers, and nearly four billion views.

Remarkable numbers for a musician who doesn’t sing, but plays solo violin over cinematic electronic music with hints of Celtic influences – with some hip hop, rock, pop and classical in the mix.

The thing about Lindsey Stirling, who’ll perform July 31 at the Baycare Sound in Clearwater, is that as a musician – and a performer – she is entirely unique. She is a thing of her own creation.

That’s because her videos, nearly 300 of them now, are as individualistic – and as important – as her music (most of which she composes, by the way).

Every piece is elaborately staged, costumed and choreographed, and each tells its own little story. They’re like mini-movies, each with a pulse-pounding (or heart-melting) soundtrack.

At the center, always, is Stirling, dancing and playing the violin, her impish pixie countenance in a ballroom, a wintry forest or an Arctic ice cave. A Mad Max-type battle arena or a Wild West frontier town.

Some will remember her from Season 5 of America’s Got Talent in 2010 (“You’re not untalented,” Piers Morgan told her, “but you’re not good enough, I don’t think, to get away with flying through the air and trying to play the violin at the same time”).

Seven years later, she was a celebrity contestant on Dancing With the Stars. Stirling and her partner secured five perfect score performances across their 17 dances, and came in second for the season.

Her tours are nearly always sellouts. Those 14.1 million subscribers are paying attention.

She has just released Duality, her eighth album, and on this tour is joined by the Canadian group Walk Off the Earth (vocalist Sarah Blackwood performs “Survive,” an adaptation of Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive,” on Duality).

Tickets for the July 31 performance are here.

St. Pete Catalyst: You created your own persona and your own musical universe. Can you tell me how that happened?

Lindsey Stirling: I was looking for the next thing, you know? I had decided that I really wanted to share this music. I finally discovered the sound and I was very excited – at the time, it was electric violin dubstep stuff, and I was like “This is really cool! Oh gosh, how do I share it?” I had done the traditional model at the time: I had tried to find a record label, I had sent my music to anyone I could think of. I made little promo packages for myself and had gone to Vegas. I went to talent agencies and literally knocked on their doors. I did a lot of college showcases; I would literally travel around on weekends and play shows, just by myself.

I had this book called How to Make it in the Music Industry, and I was so discouraged after reading it. Because it was like, you either have to know someone or you have to have a ton of money. I didn’t know how else you’d do it, according to this book.

And then just right time, right place I met a guy whose name was was Devin Graham, but he had a YouTube channel called devinsupertramp. And he taught this little, one night only, YouTube class. It was two hours, and he talked about YouTubers. It was back in 2010; YouTube was such a new thing, and I had no idea that you could have a channel on there.

Anyway, he showed all these examples of people who had created a channel, and had followings, and were doing what they loved to do. And some of them were even weirder than me! Like weirder than a dancing violinist. A guitar man who would do straight-on choruses of hundreds of kazoos. I was like, oh my gosh, this is the world for really different things.

So I jumped on it right away and started making content. And I feel so incredibly fortunate that I’ve been able to build a full career that exists not only on YouTube, and on social media, but I can tour, I can meet my fans. I can create experiences for people.

Was it a lightbulb moment when you realized you could do more in the videos than stand there and look cool? That you could choreograph them and dance while you played?

Less of a lightbulb and more of a “Wow, I look extremely boring when I play.” I had written this really huge music that people would describe as “epic” and “bold,” and yet I would just stand there and play. And so I thought OK, I’ve got to learn how to move around and how to match the energy of this music.

I was never a dancer, actually. I had never danced until I made this very conscious decision at 25 of “I need to learn how to be engaging, visually.” And so I started to learn how to just kind of jump around and skip and move and lean, kick my leg and … and anyways, through the years and tons of work and working out with choreographers … Dancing With the Stars, for sure, helped me build my confidence as a dancer … it’s become very dancing, but at the time it was just “I gotta just match the energy of the music.”

Conceptually, do you write and direct the videos yourself? Is this all you?

It actually is. I actually went to film school. I once upon a time wanted to be a director, and I think at the end of the day I love storytelling. That’s so fun to me, to take a little piece of instrumental music and make a story out of it that doesn’t need any words.

So yeah, all the music videos, all the concepts. I direct almost all of them these days. Back then, I wasn’t as confident, but since I’ve directed or co-directed most of my music videos. I will storyboard them, I have a shot list that I make, so I fully, you know, do the thing.

You started studying violin as a little kid. Was it all classical music for you in those days?

It was all classical in the beginning; I kind of didn’t know anything else could exist. I knew I loved the violin, and I played what was available. It was a very interesting shift, because I was actually going to college to study music, with a performance major, and I just realized “I don’t love this any more. Gosh, I don’t think I even like it any more.” I was so burnt out.

I realized I’m a very creative soul, so the fact I couldn’t be creative with this thing, with such a passion, it really dulled the excitement for me. And I had joined a little rock band in high school, for fun, just a side thing and I remembered really loving that. The creativity.

So I started writing my own music for the very first time. I started to experiment and try playing all different types of music to find out what I actually liked. Because as a classical violinist, you don’t even get to choose what to play. Or how to play it. For me, it really came to life in a whole new way when suddenly I got to be creative with it.

What’s your live show consist of?

It’s very theatrical, which is something I love. I love wild costumes and colors. I have the most amazing dancers, five dancers that are just incredible. I have two band members. I think that it’s a really engaging show. I don’t think there’s a moment for people to “check out.” The whole thing moves really well; I’m really proud of the feeling, and the vibe, and the journey that this show will take people on. From the set changes to the costume changes to aerial acrobatics that I do, as well as my dancers do, I really don’t think there’s a chance to get bored at all.

Even if you’ve never heard of my music, you will leave being like “Well, that was really interesting. That was really fun.”

Do you ever stop to think how you’ve come this far without ever having a hit record? That’s pretty unusual.

You don’t have to be an A-list celebrity in order to make a livelihood from something you love. There are so many tiers of artists, and as they call them, influencers – people who are making content, or making art, and they’re doing it their own way. And they’re making a living at it.

And you can do it every size. You can be doing it out of your home and make a living from it. You can tour mid-tier venues. You can tour arenas. You can be Taylor Swift. There’s a place for everybody.

And I’m really, really grateful for that. I still hope that someday I’ll get that hit, you know, that would be really fun, to make a hit. But the fact that I’ve never had it yet, and yet I still get to tour in a really big way and connect with fans all over the world … I think it’s pretty miraculous that I have been able to do that without having those huge muscles behind you, radio and massive TV exposure.

It’s been seen over and over again by my story, and many others, that you can really make a career just like chugging along, on your own pace, doing it your own way, doing it your own time, and you don’t have to rely on that big break moment from someone else.