Lindsey Stirling

Lindsey Stirling ignored career advice from Sharon Osbourne, who told her to find a group because, as a solo artist, she “is not enough to fill a theater in Vegas.” Three years later, she has yet to fill that theatre – but only because she hasn’t played Las Vegas yet.

The violin-wielding Stirling, who got the boot by Osbourne and fellow panelist Piers Morgan in the quarterfinal round of “America’s Got Talent” in 2010, picked herself up and resumed filming videos for her “Lindseystomp” channel on YouTube.

Photo: Tony Felgueiras

Stirling’s “Crystallize” was one of 2012’s top YouTube videos, with more than 40 million views. “Elements,” the channel’s current featured song, is rapidly approaching the 20 million views mark in just seven months.  

Nearly 21 million fans subscribe to the channel, which itself has been viewed more than 288 million times. She’s recently expanded to a second channel, “Lindsey Time,” which is for more personal material, like vlogs and interaction with fans.

Stirling’s been dubbed classical, hip hop, dubstep, EDM, you name it, but pigeon-holing her music is pointless. What she is, though, is a vibrant live entertainer.

“It’s not obvious, and that’s what’s cool about her, and why people connect to it,” manager Troy Carter told Pollstar.  “It’s not what you hear when you turn on a Top 40 radio station. She’s created this thing you can’t really put in a box or categorize. Everybody’s not going to understand it at first but, when you see it, you get it.

“She removed the filters. That’s the whole trick. We were having a discussion about late-night TV a couple of weeks ago and we realized Lindsey has more YouTube viewers than she could possibly get from any late-night show that we could put her on.”

Photo: John Davisson

Still, Stirling’s performance made the leap beyond YouTube and onto the live stage just last fall. Agent Craig Bruck of ICM Partners in New York signed on and put her on the road to sellout business on an initial run of  200- to 500-seaters. She can say goodbye to those.

A quick tour of Germany also sold out. Her return to the U.S. in February went clean at the 1,200-seat 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C. A month later, she filled two nights at the 1,100-seat Gothic Theatre in Englewood, Colo.  

Next up is a 30-date European tour, then it will back to the States where she’ll bypass the festivals in favor of hard-ticket, headlining shows, continuing to build her burgeoning fan base one reasonably priced show at a time, Carter said.
        
 

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