Taylor Swift Biography

Summary

"Taylor Alison Swift" (born December 13, 1989) is an American Grammy-nominated country music artist who began her career as a teenager. Signed to the independent Big Machine Records label in 2006, she made her debut on the "Billboard" country charts with the release of her debut single 'Tim McGraw'. This song, which peaked at #6, was the first of five singles from her self-titled debut, which was released in late 2006 and re-issued in 2007, and has been certified 3× Multi-Platinum by the RIAA. Following 'Tim McGraw' were the #2 'Teardrops on My Guitar', the six-week Number One 'Our Song', the #3 'Picture to Burn' and another Number One in 'Should've Said No'. All five singles from her debut were Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, as was her song 'Change' from the "AT&T TEAM USA Soundtrack". Her second album, "Fearless", will be released on November 11, and its lead-off single 'Love Story' has become her highest Hot 100 hit.

Early life

Taylor Swift was born in Wyomissing, Pennsylvania and lives with her parents, Scott and Andrea, and her brother, Austin, now in Hendersonville, Tennessee. Swift's influences include her grandmother and LeAnn Rimes. Although her grandmother was a professional opera singer, Taylor's tastes always ran more toward country and she developed a love for Patsy Cline and Dolly Parton at an early age. She also credits the Dixie Chicks and Shania Twain for demonstrating how much impact can be made by 'stretching boundaries'.

At the age of ten, Swift began to perform around her home town, Wyomissing, singing at karaoke contests, festivals, and fairs, and also started writing songs. Her first exposure to the music business consisted of recording demo tapes at a studio. At age eleven, Swift made her first trip to Nashville in hopes of obtaining a record deal by handing out a demo tape she had made of her singing along to karaoke songs. She boldly handed this tape to receptionists at every label on Music Row. Swift faced much rejection, not just from record labels, but also from her peers. When asked how she was able to handle such hurtful rejection from record labels, she responded saying that it wasn't nearly as painful as the rejection she received from the kids around her. One of the first songs she wrote, The Outside, was her expression of feeling that rejection. After Swift returned to Pennsylvania, she was asked to sing at the U.S. Open tennis tournament, when her rendition of the national anthem completely moved the crowd. Swift signed to a record label when she was thirteen years old, but walked away because it 'wasn't where she wanted to be.'

Swift began to regularly visit Nashville, where, at age 12, she wrote songs with local songwriters. Eventually, her family decided to move to an outlying Nashville suburb. Taylor Swift performed at Nashville's premier songwriters' café, The Bluebird Café, catching the attention of Scott Borchetta who signed her to his newly-formed record label, Big Machine Records.

Swift plays a Taylor Grand Auditorium acoustic guitar made of koa wood.

Music career

2006—2008: Debut album "Taylor Swift"

Swift's first single, 'Tim McGraw', was released to radio in Summer of 2006 and on October 24, 2006, her self-titled album was released. Swift wrote or co-wrote all of the songs on the album, which debuted at #19 on the Billboard 200 and sold more than 61,000 during its first week. It later peaked at #1 at Billboard Top Country Albums and #5 at Billboard 200. It also spent eight consecutive weeks at the top of the Top Country Albums charts, and has since sold over 3 million copies.

Swift has surpassed the 20 million mark for music streams on MySpace. She is currently ranked at 15 for the most MySpace visits for all genres of music, and is MySpace's current top-ranking Country artist.

Swift's debut single, 'Tim McGraw', was released in Summer 2006. 'I wrote the song in my freshman year of high school', she says. 'I was dating a guy named Brandon Borello, and I was about to move. 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'.

'Tim McGraw' peaked at #6 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts for the week of January 27, 2007. The song's music video 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. 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.

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.

On August 21, 2007, Swift performed live on the season finale of "America's Got Talent".

The second single from the "Taylor Swift" album, 'Teardrops On My Guitar', was released February 24, 2007. The song was inspired by a true event during her time in high school in which she liked a boy named 'Drew Hardwick'. He only saw Swift as a friend and a go-to person for advice about his relationship with his girlfriend. She noted she heard 'through the grapevine' that Drew is well aware the song was written about him.

'Teardrops on My Guitar' originally made its peak positions in Summer 2007, peaking at #2 on the Billboard Country 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.

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. '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.

Swift was cover girl of "Seventeen" in the June 2008 issue. She was also named number fifty-two on "Maxim's" sexiest women of '08.

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 43rd Annual Academy of Country Music Awards. 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 10 years old.

In 2008, Swift released "Beautiful Eyes", an EP sold exclusively at Wal-Mart.

In July of 2008, Swift graduated from the Aaron Academy, a Christian school which offers a home schooling program.

'Should've Said No' became her second Number One single for the chart dated August 23, 2008.

2008—present: "Fearless"

Swift's next studio album, "Fearless", is scheduled to be released in the United States on November 11, 2008.

'Change,' a song off the upcoming album, was selected as part of a soundtrack supporting Team USA's efforts in the 2008 Summer Olympics. The song was also featured as part of the soundtrack of NBC's broadcast package of the Games. She also released the lead single from the album, Love Story, on September 12, 2008. The song is accompained by a music video that is based on Romeo and Juliet. The song has reached #2 on iTunes Store Top Downloaded Songs and #5 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Philanthropy

On September 21, 2007, Swift launched a campaign to protect children from online predators.

Swift has teamed up with Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen to combat internet sex crimes.

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.