Facts Behind Sia’s Snowman Song

The Australian-born singer/songwriter Sia Kate Isobelle Furler, commonly known as Sia, released her first Christmas song and the first and only promo single from her eighth studio album, Everyday Is Christmas, in November of 2017.

Three years later, in December of 2020, the song became extremely popular due to a challenge on the video website TikTok. The challenge was both funny and quirky at the same time: subscribers on the site challenged everyone to sing about 40 seconds’ worth of the song in one breath.

So many people participated in the challenge that the song became hugely popular practically overnight, causing Sia to record a remix of the song, which she calls the “Snowed in and Slowed Down TikTok Remix.” In this remix, she replicates the sound many subscribers used when they put their own version of the song on TikTok.

The Snowman song is a mid-tempo song that is written in Db major, and if you take a look at Sia’s Snowman sheet music, you’ll notice it is written by Sia and her long-time collaborator Greg Kurstin. The song is 2 minutes and 45 seconds long and is sung by Sia in a calm but energetic voice. Snowman is a song that lets you hear Sia tell a snowman not to cry because he will melt. It is written in 6/8 time for piano and vocals, and it requires a vocal range of F3 to Gb4, which Sia can handle quite well.

Just what do the critics think of the song? Below are some comments that can help answer that question:

“A clever ode to fleeting romance… it takes something we associate with winter and applies it to a universal theme.” (Slate Magazine)

“(The remix) opts for a breezier tempo than the original, with Sia changing the song’s key midway through for extra effect.” (NME – New Music Express).

In addition, in 2020, The Athletic’s Brandon Funston listed Snowman as the 85th best Christmas song of all time. If you’re wondering just how successful the song Snowman really is, consider some of the accolades it has gotten:

• It reached number 3 on the Billboard Holiday Digital Songs Sales chart dated December 2, 2017.
• After the popularity that resulted from the TikTok challenge, the song reached the top 50 in Australia, France, Canada, and Germany, to name a few.
• It peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Global 200 and at number 18 on the Billboard Global Excl. U.S., as well as number 1 on the Finnish Singles Chart.
• A claymation music video for Snowman premiered on October 30, 2020, on YouTube and was directed by Lior Molcho.

In fact, following is a list of countries and where the song Snowman peaked at in each of them:

• Australia: 35
• Austria: 20
• Belgium: 4
• Canada: 20
• Czech Republic: 12
• Finland: 1
• France: 40
• Germany: 20
• Hungary: 10
• Ireland: 40
• The Netherlands: 25
• New Zealand: 27
• Norway: 3
• Portugal: 55
• Slovakia: 13
• South Korea: 15
• Sweden: 36
• Switzerland: 14
• United Kingdom (OCC): 78
• United States Holiday Digital Songs (Billboard): 3

Sia was born in December of 1975 in Australia and is a singer/songwriter, director, and voice actress. In the mid-1990s, she was in a band called Crisp, and when they disbanded in 1997, Sia went out on her own and released her first studio album, entitled OnlySee. Shortly thereafter, she moved to London, and in 2005 she moved to New York City and began touring and releasing more albums. She released Some People Have Real Problems in 2008 and We Are Born in 2010. They were her fourth and fifth studio albums.

The year 2014 was a big year for Sia. That year, her sixth album, 1000 Forms of Fear, debuted at number 1 on the Billboard 200. One song from the album, Chandelier, was extremely popular, and she did a series of videos that gave her almost instant fame. Since then, Sia has rarely been seen without a wig that covers her face to protect her privacy. As of early 2021, she is still writing songs and performing, and among her accolades are nine Grammy Award nominations, nearly a dozen ARIA Awards, and an MTV Video Music Award.

If you’re curious about Sia’s personal life, it is quite an interesting one. She has dated both men and women, been married to a man and divorced, and even adopted two African-American boys who were getting ready to age out of the system. One of them made her a grandmother in 2020. She is a feminist and an animal-rights activist, and she has written music for some very famous people, including Rihanna.

Since 2010, Sia has had three major tours, and her songs have been heard on soundtracks from various movies, including the following:

• The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010)
• The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013)
• Annie (2014)
• Fifty Shades of Grey (2015)
• Pitch Perfect 2 (2015)
• Finding Dory (2016)
• Star Trek Beyond (2016)
• Fifty Shades Darker (2017)
• Wonder Woman (2017)
• My Little Pony: The Movie (2017)
• Fifty Shades Freed (2018)
• A Wrinkle in Time (2018)
• Dolittle (2010)

She has also had cameos and done voice-overs for various movies, including Piccadilly Jim in 2004, Annie in 2014, Peter Rabbit in 2018, Charming in 2018, and Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway in 2021. She has had a few minor roles in numerous television shows dating back to 1997, so this is one very busy lady.

Thanks to the song Snowman and the fact that she’s rarely stopped working since 1997 – the year she turned 22 years old – Sia’s fame and fortune is no surprise. It’s very doubtful that her career will subside or end anytime soon, and if you’re curious about what makes her song Snowman such a big deal, here are the words to the first verse:

Don’t cry, snowman, not in front of me
Who’ll catch your tears if you can’t catch me, darling
If you can’t catch me, darling
Don’t cry, snowman, don’t leave me this way
A puddle of water can’t hold me close, baby
Can’t hold me close, baby

Discover more piano sheet music at FreshSheetMusic.com