Celebrity Online NewsOnline Celebrity Gossip and News

Taylor Swift extracted from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Taylor Swift
Taylor Swift performing live in 2007
Background information
Birth name	Taylor Alison Swift
Born	December 13, 1989 (1989-12-13) (age 19)
Origin	Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Genre(s)	Country pop
Occupation(s)	Singer-songwriter
Instrument(s)	Vocals, guitar, piano,1 ukulele2
Years active	2006–present
Label(s)	Big Machine
Associated acts	Colbie Caillat, Kellie Pickler, Miley Cyrus, Jonas Brothers, Brad Paisley, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Rascal Flatts, George Strait, Gloriana, T-Pain
Website	TaylorSwift.com

Taylor Alison Swift (born December 13, 1989) is an American country-pop singer-songwriter. In 2006, she released her debut single "Tim McGraw", which peaked at number six on the Billboard country charts. Later in October 2006, she released her self-titled debut album, which produced five hit singles on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts and was certified 3× Multi-Platinum by the RIAA. The New York Times described Swift as "one of pop's finest songwriters, country’s foremost pragmatist and more in touch with her inner life than most adults".³

According to Nielsen SoundScan, Swift was the biggest selling artist of 2008 in America with combined sales of more than four million albums. Swift's Fearless and her self-titled album finished 2008 at number three and number six respectively, with sales of 2.1 and 1.5 million.⁴ She was the first artist in the history of Nielsen SoundScan to have two different albums in the Top 10 on the year end album chart.⁵ Fearless has topped the Billboard 200 in 11 non-consecutive weeks.⁶ No album has spent more time at number one since 1999-2000. It also was the first album by a female artist in country music history to log eight weeks at #1 on The Billboard 200. In mid-January 2009, Swift became the first country artist to top the 2 million mark in paid downloads with three different songs.⁷ As of the week ending February 8, 2009, Swift's single "Love Story" became the country song with most paid downloads in history and the first country song to top the Mainstream Top 40 chart.⁸⁹ According to the 2009 issue of Forbes, Swift is ranked as the 69th most powerful celebrity with over $18 million dollars in earnings this year.¹⁰

Contents 1 Early life 1.1 Early work 2 Music career 2.1 2006–2008: Taylor Swift 2.2 2008–present: Fearless 2.3 2009: Fearless Tour 3 Television appearances 4 Endorsement 5 Personal life 5.1 Charitable work 6 Discography 7 Filmography 8 Awards and nominations 9 References 10 External links

Early life

Swift was born in the city of Wyomissing, Pennsylvania. She is the daughter of Scott, a stock broker, and Andrea Swift, a homemaker. She has a younger brother, Austin.¹¹ When she was in fourth grade, Swift won a national poetry contest with a three-page poem entitled "Monster In My Closet".¹²¹³ At the age of ten, Swift began writing songs and singing at karaoke contests, festivals, and fairs around her hometown. During one summer, Swift devoted herself to writing a 350-page (unpublished) novel.¹⁴ She was a member of Kirk Cremer's SNL-inspired kid's sketch comedy group, TheatreKids Live!, where she was a natural comedic talent. After seeing her karaoke performance at one of the cast parties, it was Cremer's mother who first suggested that Swift seemed more of a natural to pursue a career in country music, rather than theatrical performing. Cremer soon leased space at a local mall and began to showcase his young protégée in weeknight performances of country songs with karaoke backing tracks. Emboldened by her performances and growing audiences, she began to perform in other local open mike and karaoke nights. Her first major show was a well-received performance at the Bloomsburg Fair, arranged by local performer Pat Garrett.¹⁵

Early work

Swift's greatest musical influence is Shania Twain.¹⁶ Her other influences include her grandmother and LeAnn Rimes.¹⁷ Although her grandmother was a professional opera singer,¹⁸ Taylor's tastes always ran more toward country and she developed a love for Patsy Cline and Dolly Parton at an early age.¹⁹ She also credits the Dixie Chicks and Shania Twain for demonstrating how much impact can be made by "stretching boundaries".²⁰

At age eleven, Swift made her first trip to Nashville hoping to obtain a record deal by distributing a demo tape of her singing with karaoke songs. She gave a copy to every label on Music Row.¹⁷ Swift faced rejection, not just from record labels, but also from her peers.²¹ After Swift returned to Pennsylvania, she was asked to sing at the U.S. Open tennis tournament; her rendition of the national anthem received a lot of attention.²²

Swift started writing songs and playing 12-string guitar when she was twelve. Swift began to regularly visit Nashville and wrote songs with local songwriters. By the time she was fourteen, her family decided to move to an outlying Nashville suburb.²³ When Swift was fifteen, she rejected a development deal with RCA Records because the company refused to allow her to record her own songs.²⁴ Swift then performed at Nashville's songwriters' venue, The Bluebird Café, catching the attention of Scott Borchetta²⁵ who signed her to his newly-formed record label, Big Machine Records. She also became the youngest staff songwriter ever hired by the Sony/ATV Tree publishing house.²⁶

Music career

2006–2008: Taylor Swift

Swift's first single, "Tim McGraw", was released to radio in mid-2006 and reached number 6 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart during the week of January 27, 2007.²⁷ Swift said, "I wrote the song in my freshman year of high school. I was dating a guy who was about to go off to college. I knew we were going to break up so I started thinking of all the things that I knew would remind him of me. Surprisingly, the first thing that came to mind was that my favorite country artist is Tim McGraw."¹⁹ Her self-titled debut album Taylor Swift was released on October 24, 2006.²⁸ Swift wrote or co-wrote all of the songs on the album, which debuted at number 19 on the Billboard 200 and sold 39,000 copies during its first week.²⁹ It later peaked at number one at Billboard Top Country Albums and number five on the Billboard 200.³⁰ It also spent eight consecutive weeks at the top of the Top Country Albums charts³¹ and remained at the top for 24 out of 91 weeks.³² The only other country artists this decade to achieve the number-one sales position for 20 weeks or more are The Dixie Chicks and Carrie Underwood.³³ As of November 2008, Taylor Swift has sold over three million copies and 7.5 million single downloads.³⁴

Swift has surpassed the 200 million mark for music streams on MySpace. She is currently ranked in the Top 10 for the most MySpace visits for all genres of music, and is MySpace's current top-ranking Country artist.^{35dead link} Swift is the most searched musical artist on MySpace in 2008.³⁶

The music video for "Tim McGraw" set a record by appearing for 30 consecutive weeks on GAC's fan-voted weekly Top 20 music countdown show, and reached number one on CMT's video charts. The video also won Swift an award for Breakthrough Video of the Year at the 2007 CMT Music Awards.³⁷ Her pursuit of country music stardom was the subject of "GAC Short Cuts", a part-documentary, part-music-video series airing since the summer of 2006 on the country music channel.³⁸

On May 15, 2007, Swift performed "Tim McGraw" at the Academy of Country Music Awards. She sang the song to Tim McGraw in the audience, and introduced herself for the first time to him. Swift has been an opening act for Tim McGraw and Faith Hill on their Soul2Soul 2007 tour. She has opened in the past for George Strait, Brad Paisley and Rascal Flatts as well.³⁹ On August 21, 2007, Swift performed live on the season finale of America's Got Talent.⁴⁰

The second single from the Taylor Swift album, "Teardrops on My Guitar", was released February 24, 2007. The song originally made its peak positions in mid-2007, peaking at #2 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart and #33 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song was re-released to the Hot 100 and Pop 100 in late 2007 with a pop remix that brought "Teardrops on My Guitar" to #13 on the Hot 100 and #11 on the Pop 100.

In October 2007, Swift's songwriting peers at the Nashville Songwriters Association International honored her with their Songwriter/Artist of the Year Award, making her the youngest artist ever to win the award.⁴¹

On November 7, 2007, Swift won the 2007 CMA Horizon Award and also performed "Our Song," the third single from her album, which would go on to become her first #1 song the week of December 22, 2007, where it leaped up from the #6 spot. This was the biggest jump to Number One since January 1998, when Tim McGraw's "Just to See You Smile", also jumped from #6 to #1.⁴² "Our Song" spent six weeks at #1 on the Country charts and also peaked at #16 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #24 on the Billboard Pop 100.

Swift also recorded a holiday album, Sounds of the Season: The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection, that was released October 16, 2007, exclusively available at Target stores. The album, which was not as successful as her self-titled debut, featured both holiday classics such as "Last Christmas" and original songs written by Swift.

Swift was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award in the category of Best New Artist, but lost to Amy Winehouse. Swift's successful single, "Picture to Burn" was the fourth single from her debut album. The song debuted early in 2008 and peaked at #3 on the Billboard Country Chart in the spring of 2008.

Big Machine Records announced the release of "Should've Said No" on Monday, May 19. The song is the fifth and final single from Swift's debut album. She performed it on the 43rd Annual Academy of Country Music Awards.⁴³ The performance started off with her dressed in a hooded sweatshirt and jeans, but soon after a short black halter dress was revealed. In the last minute of the song, she went backstage to perform the final verse under a cascading waterfall. Swift had wanted to do that performance on stage with the water and the change of clothes since she was ten years old.⁴⁴ "Should've Said No" became her second Number One single for the chart dated August 23, 2008.

In June 2008, at the CMA Music Festival held in Nashville, Swift signed autographs for nearly eight straight hours. It was the longest autograph-signing session since Garth Brooks' 23-hour marathon in 1996.⁴⁵

In Summer 2008, Swift released Beautiful Eyes, an EP sold exclusively at Wal-Mart.⁴⁶ In its first week of release, the album sold 45,000 copies, debuting at #1 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart and #9 on the Billboard 200. With her self-titled debut album at #2 the same week, Swift became the first artist to hold the Top 2 positions of the Top Country Albums chart since LeAnn Rimes did so in 1997.⁴⁷

Swift plays a custom-made Taylor acoustic guitar made of koa wood.⁴⁸

2008–present: Fearless

Swift's latest studio album, Fearless, was released in the United States on November 11, 2008.⁴⁹ The album debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart. Its sales of 592,304 was the highest debut of any country artists in 2008. This is also the largest opening U.S. sales week in 2008 by a female artist in all genres of music, and the fourth biggest overall behind Lil Wayne, AC/DC and Coldplay.⁵⁰ Its lead single "Love Story" became a hit on both the country and pop charts.

During the first week of release, more than 129,000 of Swift's sales were sold digitally. This gives Swift the best online start for any country album in history.⁵¹ It also makes Swift the fourth biggest week for a digital album since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking them in 2004.⁵² Through its eighth week of release, Fearless has sold more than 338,467 paid downloads, making it the bestselling country album in digital history. In second place is Swift's debut Taylor Swift with sales of 236,046 downloads as of April 18, 2009.⁵³

In its debut week, seven songs in total on Fearless were charted on Billboard Hot 100, tying Swift with Hannah Montana for the most by a female artist in a single week. With "White Horse" charted at #13, this gave Swift her sixth top 20 debut of 2008, a calendar year record for any artist in the history of the Billboard Hot 100. Of the 13 tracks on Fearless, 11 have already spent time on the Hot 100.⁵²

"Change", a song from the album, was selected as part of a soundtrack supporting Team USA's efforts in the 2008 Summer Olympics.⁴⁷ The song was also featured as part of the soundtrack of NBC's broadcast package of the Olympics. She also released the lead single from the album, "Love Story", on September 12, 2008. The song is accompanied by a music video that is based on Romeo and Juliet. The song has reached number 2 on iTunes Store Top Downloaded Songs and number four on the Billboard Hot 100. Fifteen weeks after being added to pop radio, "Love Story" also became the first country crossover recording to hit number one on the Nielsen BDS CHR/Top 40 chart in the 16-year-history of list, as well as number one on the Mediabase Top 40 Chart.⁵⁴ The second single from Fearless, "White Horse", was released on December 8, 2008. The music video for the song premiered on CMT on February 7, 2009. Though it missed the #1 spot on Billboard's Hot Country Songs as of the week April 11, 2009, "White Horse" claimed the #1 spot atop the USA Today/Country Aircheck chart (powered by Mediabase) in that week.⁵⁵ "Forever & Always", another song from the album, was based on Swift's relationship with singer Joe Jonas.⁵⁶

Swift is Billboard's Top Country Artist and Hot Country Songwriter of 2008; she is also country music's best-selling artist of 2008.⁵⁷

Swift ranked seventh on Nielsen SoundScan Canada's top-10 selling artists across all genres in 2008. Fearless and Taylor Swift took the #1 and #2 slots on 2008 Year-End Canadian Country Albums Chart.⁵⁸

Swift sang the Star-Spangled Banner at game three of the World Series in Philadelphia on October 25, 2008.

On January 10, 2009, Swift made her first musical guest appearance on Saturday Night Live, making her the youngest country singer to appear as a musical guest on the show in its 33-year run.⁵⁹⁶⁰ Swift's show achieved SNL’s highest adult 18-49 rating and overall viewer total since the November election (in 2008). It was tied for the #7 rating of that week among all broadcast and cable entertainment programs on all networks and outscored all its telecasts of last season in 18-49 and total viewers.⁶¹

On February 8, 2009, Swift performed her song "Fifteen" with Miley Cyrus at the 51st Grammy Awards.

Since the release of Swift's second album, Fearless, she has released one new song "Crazier" for the soundtrack of the feature film Hannah Montana: The Movie.

At the 44th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards, Swift picked up Album of the Year honors as a performer and producer for Fearless. She is the youngest artist in history to win Album Of The Year award. Swift was also awarded the Academy's Crystal Milestone Award, given for Outstanding Achievement in Country Music. The Academy lauded her for career achievements including selling more albums in 2008 than any other artist in any genre of music, the breakthrough success of her debut album (which spawned five Top 10 hits, more than any in history for a female artist's debut CD), and the worldwide crossover success of her #1 single "Love Story". The Academy also cited Swift's contribution to helping country music attract a younger audience.⁶²

As of late April 2009, Swift has sold more than 14 million downloads, as well as three Gold Mobile Ringtones.⁶³ In June 2009, Swift performed "Thug Story" with T-Pain at the CMT Music Awards. She went on to win two awards for Female Video of the Year and Video of the Year.⁶⁴

2009: Fearless Tour

In January 2009, Swift announced her first headlining tour. Swift will take her North American Fearless Tour 2009 to 52 cities in 38 states and provinces in the US and Canada over the span of 6 months. Opening acts include Kellie Pickler and Gloriana, a new group in country music. The tour will feature a theatrical presentation of graphics, sets and visual elements designed by Swift. Swift will play guitar as well as piano. Multiple costume changes and a fairy-tale castle are some of the elements of the three-act show.⁶⁵

The tour kicked off April 23 in Evansville, Indiana. On February 6, 2009, tickets went on sale for the May 22 date at Los Angeles’ Staples Center and sold out in two minutes.⁶⁶ Tickets for several dates and venues, including Madison Square Garden, went on sale the following week and sold out quickly.^6768697071

On April 28, 2009, Swift gave a free, private concert to students at Bishop Ireton High School, a small Catholic school in Alexandria, Virginia after the school won a national "TXT 2 WIN" contest from Verizon Wireless.⁷² The students sent over 19,000 text messages to Verizon during a roughly one month long contest. Swift played for about an hour during the school's field day, an annual day-long recess with games and activities.

Television appearances

In 2008, Swift made her acting debut in Brad Paisley's music video "Online". In that same year Swift filmed a documentary for MTV entitled MTV's Once Upon a Prom and a documentary with Def Leppard for CMT entitled CMT Crossroads, which was premiered on November 7, 2008, drew more than 4.5 million viewers for its four initial airings.⁷³

Swift collaborated with the Jonas Brothers in their 3D Concert Film, Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience. The film was released on February 27, 2009 in North America. The concert film brought in $12,700,000 on its opening weekend.⁷⁴

Swift made her primetime television acting debut on CBS's CSI: Crime Scene Investigation on March 5, 2009 in the U.S. and Canada. The episode was watched by 20.8 million viewers.⁷⁵

Swift made a cameo appearance in Kellie Pickler's music video "Best Days of Your Life". Swift also appeared in Hannah Montana: The Movie as "woman singing in the barn". The film was released on April 10, 2009 in North America.⁷⁶ The film grossed $17.4 million on opening day, and $32 million on opening weekend, to earn the #1 spot at the box office.⁷⁷ The film grossed $17.4 million on opening day, and $32 million on opening weekend, to earn the #1 spot at the box office.⁷⁸

The television show Dateline NBC showcased an hour to Swift on May 31, 2009. The episode titled Dateline NBC: On Tour With Taylor Swift included scenes from her tour bus, concert footage, and rehearsals. She was also interviewed for the show and some of her exclusive video diaries were shown.⁷⁹

Endorsement

Jakks Pacific released a celebrity doll of Swift in late 2008.⁸⁰ Swift and the L.e.i. Clothing Line made a deal to create a line based on Swift's style of dressing. It will appear in Wal-Mart in the coming months.⁸¹ However, Swift said she does not want to be called a designer. Instead, she says she will inspire the clothing company's dress line based on her own style. "I don't look at it like I'm branching out as a designer... It's not the Taylor Swift designer line."⁸² In 2009, Swift became the National Hockey League's newest celebrity spokesperson. She appears in commercials for the Nashville Predators.⁸³

Swift is an endorser of Body By Milk, a campaign calling teenagers to drink low fat milk to maintain a healthy weight.⁸⁴

Personal life

Swift's best friend has been Abigail Anderson, whom she has known since their ninth-grade year. During a discussion of Shakespeare in an English class they learned what they had in common. "We were the ones in the back of the class saying negative things about Romeo and Juliet because we were so bitter toward that emotion at the time," said Anderson. "We just really connected ... and ever since then we have been inseparable."⁸⁵ Swift is also close friends with Kellie Pickler, with whom she co-wrote Pickler's second single "Best Days of Your Life" from her self-titled album Kellie Pickler.⁸⁶

In July 2008, Swift graduated from the Aaron Academy, a Christian school in Hendersonville, Tennessee which offers a home-schooling program.⁸⁷

Swift has been featured on the cover of a number of magazines. In 2008, the list includes Blender, Seventeen,⁸⁸ Billboard,⁸⁹ Girl's Life, Women's Health and CosmoGirl.⁹⁰ In 2009, Swift graced the cover of Teen Vogue,⁹¹ Self Magazine,⁹² Rolling Stone,⁹³, Allure⁹⁴, and Glamour⁹⁵

Swift has been a cover girl for Blender, for which Swift was one of two country artists during the magazine’s fifteen year run to be a cover subject.⁹⁶ Swift was named number fifty-seven on Maxim's sexiest women of 2008.⁹⁷ CosmoGirl voted Swift as the "2008 Girl of the Year".⁹⁸ Swift was named by Rolling Stone magazine as one of "The RS 100: Agents of Change".⁹⁹ She was nominated as a candidate for TIME's "2009 The Time 100 Finalists" list, which is determined by online voting.¹⁰⁰

Charitable work

On September 21, 2007, Swift launched a campaign to protect children from online predators.¹⁰¹ She has teamed up with Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen to combat internet sex crimes.¹⁰¹ The year-long campaign, launched in partnership with the Tennessee Association of Chiefs of Police, will distribute Internet safety information and materials to parents and students across the state.¹⁰¹

In early 2008, Swift donated the pink Chevy pick-up truck given to her by her record label to children’s charity, the Victory Junction Gang; in June, 2008, Swift donated all the proceeds she got from her merchandise sales at the 2008 Country Music Festival to Red Cross, the Nashville Area Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund and the National American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund.¹⁰²

Swift donated $10,000, funded by CMT ONE COUNTRY, to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital by winning the "Video of the Year" and "Female Video of the Year" awards at the 2008 CMT Music Awards.¹⁰³

Swift donated $100,000 to the Red Cross in Cedar Rapids, Iowa to help the victims of the Iowa flood of 2008.¹⁰⁴

Swift has teamed up with Sound Matters to make listeners aware of listening "responsibly".¹⁰⁵

Swift supports @15, a teen-led social change platform underwritten by Best Buy to give teens opportunities to direct the company's philanthropy through the newly-created @15 Fund. Swift's song, "Fifteen", is featured in this campaign.¹⁰⁶

Swift has lent her support to the Victorian Bushfire Appeal by joining the lineup at Sydney's Sound Relief concert,¹⁰⁷ reportedly making the biggest contribution of any artist playing at Sound Relief to the Australian Red Cross.¹⁰⁸

Swift donated her prom dress, which raised $1,200 for charity, to DonateMyDress.org.¹⁰⁹

Discography

Albums

• 2006: Taylor Swift
• 2008: Fearless

EPs

• 2007: Sounds of the Season: The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection
• 2008: Beautiful Eyes

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
2009	Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience	Herself	Cameo
	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	Haley Jones	Episode "Turn, Turn, Turn"
	Hannah Montana: The Movie	Herself	Cameo

Awards and nominations

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Taylor Swift

• Official website
• Taylor Swift at the Internet Movie Database

v • d • e Taylor Swift Studio albums Taylor Swift · Fearless Tours Fearless Tour EPs Sounds of the Season: The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection · Beautiful Eyes Singles "Tim McGraw" · "Teardrops on My Guitar" · "Our Song" · "Picture to Burn" · "Should've Said No" · "Love Story" · "White Horse" · "You Belong with Me" Other singles "Change" · "Fearless" · "You're Not Sorry" · "Fifteen" · "Crazier" · "American Girl" Films Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience · Hannah Montana: The Movie Related articles Discography · Big Machine Records · AT&T TEAM USA Soundtrack · List of awards and nominations

Persondata
NAME	Swift, Taylor Alison
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Swift, Taylor
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Singer and songwriter
DATE OF BIRTH	December 13, 1989
PLACE OF BIRTH	Wyomissing, Pennsylvania
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH