Even though Maria Schneider is 1,205 miles away from U.S. Bank Stadium, the Grammy-winning composer watches Vikings games at her New York City apartment.
Are you ready for a thunderous new rouser for the Vikings?
Grammy-winning Maria Schneider composes a new fight song for her home team.
The Minnesota Star Tribune
January 2, 2025 at 3:50PM
She was so inspired by the 2018 Minneapolis Miracle — remember when Vikings receiver Stefon Diggs caught a desperation last-second touchdown to win a playoff game? — that she immediately composed a Vikings fight song and recorded it with a little help from superstar soprano Renée Fleming and trombonists from the award-winning Maria Schneider Orchestra.
But when the Vikings were routed a week later in the NFC Championship game, a disillusioned Schneider lost momentum to fight for her song.
Until this year, that is.
With her team on a roll — the Vikings are 14-2 and could earn the NFC’s top seed with a win over Detroit in their regular-season finale Sunday — the Minnesota native is trying to drum up attention for her 50-second rouser, her first piece with lyrics.
“I’ve waited my whole life to see the Vikings go all the way — I just wanted to do my part,” said Schneider, who grew up in Windom and graduated from the University of Minnesota.
First, she did her homework after the Minneapolis Miracle back in January 2018.
“I looked up online what the fight song was for the Vikings, and it was so lame, I’m sorry to say,” she said. “They need something with testosterone. Something befitting the name Vikings. The Vikings are warriors.”
Her untitled Vikings fight song is a thunderous battle cry that roars like an aggro “We Are the Champions” on steroids.
“A lot of times when I’m writing music, it feels grueling. This one came to me really quick. It was so fun,” she said Sunday at halftime of the Vikings-Packers game before later texting “This is paaaainful!!!” and “Whew!!!!” as the Vikings held on for a 27-25 victory. “I never write lyrics. It was divine inspiration.”
Schneider reached out to Fleming to help find baritone singers at the Juilliard School. Then she enlisted a drum programmer and trombonists from her own orchestra.
They made the recording in less than three hours. “A few passes on the ‘Skol,’ ” the bandleader explained of the chant. “It was a little too high-pitched.”
At the suggestion of her assistant this fall, Schneider went to New York’s Central Park to shoot a video, complete with a Viking helmet secured online. The composer provided her own pigtails.
“We were doing it on a whim and having fun. When I saw it, I thought it was hysterical,” Schneider said. “I was coming back from the park and a man said to me, ‘Nice costume’ ‘cause it was just before Halloween. I said, ‘It’s not a costume.’ He looked at me like ‘Wow! Another New York freak.’ "
Fumbled Vikings connection
Recently, Schneider passed her rouser to former Vikings receiver Gene Washington (1967-72), who lived in the same Edina senior facility as her mother. But he fumbled with the technology, and the piece never made it to Vikings headquarters in Eagan.
Schneider, 64, has been a Vikings fan her entire life. Fran Tarkenton, the original Vikings quarterback in 1961, is her favorite player. She tries to watch the games on TV (when they’re available in New York City) or on computer. She’s never been to a Vikings game in person, but her sister and nephew have.
She is so into it that she even watched the Detroit Lions-San Francisco game on Monday night to scout Minnesota’s next opponent.
Schneider is not the first acclaimed Minnesota musician to create a Vikings song. In 2010, Prince wrote and recorded “Purple and Gold,” reportedly after the Vikings routed Dallas 34-3 in a playoff game. He released the 3-minute and 42-second chant-along song on Vikings.com.
Schneider, like Prince, is diminutive but with an outsized reputation. Each has collected seven Grammys. Schneider has triumphed as an arranger, bandleader and composer (in both jazz and classical categories). She has topped DownBeat magazine’s critics polls many times, including last year for best big band and best composer.
Even though Schneider has lived in New York for her entire professional career, she has found ways to incorporate Minnesota into her music. Her 2015 Grammy-winning album, “The Thompson Fields,” was inspired by prairies and small-town community vibes, with photos from southwestern Minnesota.
“I guess this [rouser] is my next level devotion to Minnesota,” she said.
And she’s proud of her piece, as brief as it is.
“I don’t want anything for it in terms of royalties,” she said. “I don’t know if you can copy[right] two notes. All I want from it is the thrill knowing that when there’s Vikings games, that people scream, ‘We’re Vikings.’ ”
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