In the span of 11 albums, Taylor Swift has written or co-written every song on each release. She has also written standalone singles, songs for film soundtracks and penned tracks for other artists. Swift’s soaring melodies and incisive lyricism have earned her widespread critical acclaim and an intensely loyal fan base. She is widely regarded as one of the most influential artists of her generation.
The country world feigned surprise when, after three albums of Music Row-indebted songcraft, Swift formally embraced pop on 2012’s Red. But the 14-year-old who convinced her parents to move to Nashville had ambition to burn. Swift’s melodic intelligence has held up well, from the youthful love songs that heralded 2010’s Speak Now to the knowing, ironclad pop fare that anchored 1989 and its attendant tour.
A songwriter and producer as well as singer, she has collaborated with artists such as Calvin Harris (on “This Is What You Came For”) and Zayn Malik (on “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever”). She has also contributed to the Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack and penned a track for The Hunger Games.
At a Nashville industry showcase in 2005, Swift caught the attention of Scott Borchetta, who was preparing to form Big Machine Records as an independent label. Her father bought a three percent stake in the company for her, and she became one of its first signings.
Over the course of her career, Swift has earned dozens of accolades, including multiple Grammy awards and six VMA nominations. She is the youngest artist ever to win Songwriter of the Year and the first woman in history to receive three consecutive wins in the coveted Album of the Year category, for her albums Fearless, Red and 1989. She has made several tours, including the massively successful Speak Now World Tour, which grossed more than $123 million.
Swift’s penchant for writing about drama-filled relationships made her a darling of the country radio scene, and she was nominated for five CMA Awards in 2009 and won two. That same year, she appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone and was named Billboard’s Female Artist of the Year.
The multi-platinum star continued her streak of success in 2021 with the release of folklore’s sister album, evermore, as well as a full-length collaboration with Jack Antonoff and Bon Iver called Midnights. These ruminative, relatively lo-fi releases topped the US charts and were described as “the stories of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life.” In 2023, she embarked on one of the most ambitious road shows of all time with the multi-year Eras Tour. The wildly popular project saw Taylor present new and classic material to crowds in more than 100 locales around the globe.
