How Renaissance art inspired Fleet Foxes’ song ‘White Winter Hymnal’
When it comes to indie folk giants Fleet Foxes, the track ‘White Winter Hymnal’ is often viewed as a gateway drug into the rest of the group’s work. Formed in Seattle in 2006, the band came to prominence with the release of their self-titled debut album on Sub Pop two years later. Noted for their mastery of the era’s indie folk-rock sound, the bearded collective pushed carpentry and craft ales back to the forefront of culture in beautiful style.
Upon the release of their eponymous debut, the band quickly found themselves propelled into mainstream success. A fairly young outfit, frontman Robin Pecknold was in his early 20s during this time. Their instant success came as a shock, and adjusting to their newfound fame was difficult. Make no mistake about it, though: Fleet Foxes did not tailor themselves for mainstream pop success.
If you want to write a hit pop song, you would probably start with the theme of love and relationships. Fleet Foxes, on the other hand, took their inspiration from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and the Flemish Renaissance artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder – birds of a feather, as they say.
Pecknold has spoken at length about ‘White Winter Hymnal’, telling Mojo in 2009 that he intended the song to be gently uplifting, akin to ‘Whistle While You Work’ from Snow White; he said: “Something to hum along to as you do the dishes”. As opposed to the soundtrack of the Walt Disney classic, the lyrics of the Fleet Foxes track are much more melancholic. “From first grade to high school I spent every day with the same bunch of kids,” the singer explained, “And it was weird to see how people I had known so long would change so quickly – suddenly they’re drug dealers. I hated it. How did our friendships become less important than wearing a backwards baseball cap?”
The influence of Brugel comes in the form of the cover art for the group’s seminal debut. His painting, Netherlandish Proverbs, adorns the sleeve of the critically acclaimed album. The painting, depicting a chaotic scene of 16th-century peasant life, seemed a fitting album cover for Pecknold: “I liked that it had a really intriguing meaning, like there’s a story to each little scene,” he explained. “Which I just felt fitting for that record- dense but unified, not a collage or anything. And I liked its Where’s Waldo? quality, that it was something you could look at for a long time on a vinyl sleeve and find new little things”.
According to the frontman, it was easy to get the Berlin museum, which housed the painting, to agree to it being used, and the much-loved album exposed the Flemish painter to a whole new audience. Fittingly, given the chaotic, absurd scenes that Bruegel is known for, the story behind ‘White Winter Hymnal’ is similarly spontaneous. Pecknold once revealed to The Seattle Times: “We never played it together. The performances that you hear recorded on that song were the first time those were done. So that one totally came together in recording”.
Since its release, the track has become a favourite to play live and remains one of the band’s most popular songs. In fact, the lead singer has picked out the track as his outright favourite track to perform, though he does note that “singing it live is sometimes difficult because the lyrics are so vague”. And that sense of expression uber alles is borne from the vivid world of the Renaissance.
