Suni Lee's Olympic Floor Routine Music Maker — Viral Violinist Lindsey Stirling — Reveals How It All Happened (Exclusive)

Like music can enhance a scene in a TV show, the song Suni Lee used for her floor routine at the Paris Olympics left a lasting impression on viewers. 

One fan declared that the 21-year-old gymnast — who was on her “redemption tour” after bouncing back from an incurable kidney disease that nearly ended her career — won the fictitious gold for “coolest floor routine music.” Other viewers said the music is “stuck in their heads” and sounded like a “soundtrack for an HBO fantasy series.”

That song? Viral violinist Lindsey Stirling’s “Eye of the Untold Her.”

Now, Stirling, 37, is exclusively telling PEOPLE how Lee ended up choosing the song for her routine, which helped her win gold in the team final and bronze in the individual all-around final. 

“Back in January, I actually reached out to Suni via Instagram to see if she was looking for floor routine music,” Stirling says. “When she said she was, I shared a link to my unreleased album. Outside of my direct management team, she was the first person to hear my whole album. She wrote me back saying she was going to use ‘Eye of the Untold Her.’ ”

Stirling says it was “really cool” to see Kendall Jenner share Lee’s floor routine on her Instagram Stories with her song playing in the background.

The violinist was also “stunned” by the announcers in Paris shouting out her name before Lee’s performance, which Stirling documented in an emotional reaction video on Instagram.

“I watched Suni’s floor routine in the team all around from my tour bus,” says Stirling, who is traveling the U.S. on her Duality Tour. “My dancers and I stayed on the bus to cheer her on. Once she started performing I got super emotional. Tears were streaming down my face the whole time.”

Stirling chalks up her reaction to being a longtime gymnastics fan and knowing Lee’s comeback from being sidelined from her kidney disease. 

“She is a warrior and she’s overcome so much to get back to the Olympics,” she says. “Suni truly embodies the message of what my song was written about and she performed it so magically.”

After Team USA won gold, Stirling messaged Lee to congratulate her.

Now, Lee is planning to attend one of Stirling’s future concerts. “I am very excited to meet her,” the musician tells PEOPLE.

Lee previously used Stirling’s music at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. 

“I was on tour at the time and I got off stage to 20 messages saying that my music was in the Olympics. It was a cool moment,” she recalls.

Coincidentally, Stirling is “good friends” with Sasha Farber, who was Lee’s Dancing with the Stars partner for season 30 in 2021. 

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Stirling’s “Eye of the Untold Her” has now been Shazam’d more than 111,000 times, partly due to Lee's Olympic floor routine. 

“It’s just crazy how life unfolds sometimes,” Stirling emphasizes.

“You work hard, and try all the things you know how to do and knock on all the doors you can and sometimes it feels like nothing is moving — but then boom!” she says. “Something happens completely out of your control and everything changes. [It’s] a moment I will never forget.”