Taylor Alison Swift (born December 13, 1989) is a Grammy Award winning American singer, songwriter and actress.
She dated Harry Styles for two months in 2012. They split in early January 2013.
Background[]
Swift was born on December 13, 1989, to bankers Scott and Andrea Swift in Reading Hospital, Pennsylvania.
At 14, Taylor convinced her parents to move to Nashville, Tennessee, so she could pursue her dreams of becoming a country singer. Taylor's first record label wanted her to wait until she was 18 to begin writing and releasing her own material. She instead signed with upcoming independent label Big Machine Records, as it was being founded, and remains with them today.
Swift originally established herself as a country artist, but gradually transitioned into pop music. Her fourth album, Red, featured a mixture of country and pop songs, while her fifth album, 1989, marked her complete crossover into pop. 1989 was one of the biggest selling albums of all time.
Swift is one of the best selling artists of all time and has won ten Grammy Awards. In 2016, she became the first female artist to win the Album Of The Year Grammy twice.
Relationships[]
Swift dated pop singer Joe Jonas from July to October 2008 and famously publicized his 20-second break-up with her over the phone. Swift then dated actor Taylor Lautner from October to December 2009, after they starred in Valentine's Day together. She dated musician John Mayer from late 2009 until early 2010, and spoke about the borderline abusive relationship in her song 'Dear John'. She dated actor Jake Gyllenhaal from October to December 2010. Following their break-up, they were seen together in January and February 2011. Swift dated political heir Conor Kennedy from July to September 2012, then dated Harry Styles from October 2012 to January 2013.
Swift did not date in 2013 or 2014, citing an unwillingness to deal with the additional media attention. "I have this feeling like if I were to open myself up to love, that would be a career weakness." Swift spoke against her reputation as a maneater in promotional interviews for 1989, claiming it was sexism, and deconstructed the image placed upon her by the media in her 2014 hit single ''Blank Space''.
From March 2015 to June 2016, Swift dated Scottish DJ Calvin Harris. In June 2015, they were ranked as the highest-paid celebrity couple of the year by Forbes, with combined earnings of over $146 million. On June 1, 2016, People Magazine announced the couple had split after 15 months together[1]. Harris eventually spoke about the split, stating "For both of us it was the wrong situation. The aftermath of the relationship was way more heavily publicised than the relationship itself. When we were together, we were very careful for it not to be a media circus. She respected my feelings in that sense. I'm not good at being a celebrity, [But] when it ended, all hell broke loose." He also addressed comments he made on Twitter towards Swift, stating "It was completely the wrong instinct. I was protecting what I see as my one talent in the world being belittled. It felt like things were piling on top of me, and that was when I snapped. Now I see that Twitter thing as a result of me succumbing to pressure. It took me a minute to realise that none of that matters. I'm a positive guy."[2]
Two weeks after her split from Harris, photographs of Taylor kissing UK actor Tom Hiddleston in Rhode Island were published by The Sun[3]. Swift and Hiddleston had been previously photographed attending a dinner together then filmed dancing together at the MET Gala afterparty in May 2016. Through July 2016, "Hiddleswift" conducted a whirlwind series of dates, starting in Rhode Island for Swift's annual Fourth of July party, then heading to Nashville to meet her parents, followed by London to meet his, then Rome and Australia's Gold Coast (where Hiddleston began filming Thor 3) before returning to the United States by the end of the month. Hiddleston eventually returned to Australia to continue filming. On September 6, 2016, it was confirmed the couple had split after three months together.[4] Neither party has commented on the split so far.
On August 25, 2017, Swift released "Look What You Made Me Do", the first single from her new album "Reputation", due to be released on November 10, 2017. The song broke several streaming and radio records, while the music video broke the record for most views in 24 hours, with 39 million views. The song takes aim at Swift's numerous critics and sees Swift embracing what the media and public considers to be her worst attributes, such as "playing the victim" and "being a snake".
Sexuality Speculation[]
Swift is strongly rumoured to be a closeted lesbian, with rumours persisting over the years about her relationship to female celebrities such as Karlie Kloss, Dianna Agron and Emily Poe, as well as her strengthened public association with LGBT+ causes since 2014. Rumours also persist as many of the famous men Taylor dates also have considerable speculation about their sexuality, leading some fans to wonder if she "beards" for them (pretends to be dating them), in order to cover for both.
Personal Life[]
Taylor relocated permanently from Nashville to New York City in 2014. She currently lives there with her two cats, Olivia Benson and Meredith Grey, named after main characters from US TV shows Law and Order and Grey's Anatomy. Swift also has homes in Rhode Island and Los Angeles. Taylor is close friends with Ed Sheeran. They collaborated on "Everything Has Changed" from her 2012 album, RED. She is also friends with many female celebrities including Selena Gomez, Cara Delevingne, Lena Dunham, Camilla Cabello, Lorde, Karlie Kloss and Gigi Hadid.
Her ex-boyfriends over the years have been the subject of many songs penned by Swift. She has dated Brandon Borello, Jordan Alford, Sam Armstrong, Joe Jonas, Taylor Lautner, Jake Gyllenhaal, John Mayer, Conor Kennedy, Harry Styles, Calvin Harris and Tom Hiddleston. Jonas, Styles and Mayer have all written songs either confirmed or speculated to be responses to Swift.
Relationship with One Direction[]
Swift met One Direction at the 2012 Kids Choice Awards on March 31, 2012. In October 2012, after Swift's relationship with Conor Kennedy had officially ended, reports of Swift having dinner with Harry began to surface. In November 2012, both were photographed wearing matching paper airplane necklaces. In early December 2012, Taylor and Harry were photographed out and about together in New York. Swift attended the afterparty for One Direction's sold-out Madison Square Garden concert, along with mutual friend Ed Sheeran. During the party, Taylor reenacted the "swan leap" from Dirty Dancing with Harry. Harry was later seen entering and leaving Taylor's hotel over the following weeks, and the pair headed to Harry's hometown of Cheshire in mid December. Before heading back to New York City to celebrate New Years Eve together, Harry met Taylor's parents in Nashville. Rumors of a split began to build when Harry was late arriving to Times Square to count down to the new year with Taylor. However, the two shared a midnight kiss in front of hundreds of fans. In early January, Taylor vacationed in the Virgin Islands with Harry. They appeared to split during the vacation, as Taylor flew home alone and tweeted "Til you put me down", which is a lyric from her song "I Knew You Were Trouble". Harry returned to the United Kingdom on January 7 2013, and media subsequently confirmed the pair had split. Neither spoke publicly about their relationship at all during their time together.
Harry and Taylor posed for a picture together with Ed Sheeran at the 2013 MTV VMAs. Taylor revealed in October 2014 that songs from her fifth album, 1989, were about her relationship with Harry, specifically Style and Out Of The Woods. When asked, Harry said he did not mind being written about, as it is to be expected of singers and songwriters. Harry would go on to write Perfect with Louis Tomlinson in 2015, featuring the lyric "If you're looking for someone to write your break-up songs about", which many took to be a reference to Swift. Harry and Taylor briefly crossed paths twice in 2015. The first was in January when both attended a mutual friend's birthday party in New York. The second in May, when both attended the 2015 Billboard Awards. Niall and Louis attended Swift's afterparty, along with Ed Sheeran and Calvin Harris.
On December 8 2016, Taylor surprise released a duet with former One Direction member Zayn Malik, titled "I Don't Wanna Live Forever", for the Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack.
Awards and Achievements[]
Swift has received many awards and honors, including 10 Grammy Awards, 19 American Music Awards, 11 Country Music Association Awards, 8 Academy of Country Music Awards, 22 Billboard Music Awards, 1 Brit Award and 1 Emmy . Swift is also the most awarded artist at the Teen Choice Awards, with 25 awards. As a songwriter, she has been honored by the Nashville Songwriters Association and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. In 2016, the Broadcast Music Inc Awards gave her the first ever Taylor Swift Award, based primarily around songwriting[5].
By the beginning of 2016, Swift had sold more than 40 million albums, 130 million single downloads and was one of the top five music artists with the highest worldwide digital sales. Each of Swift's studio albums had sold at least four million units in the U.S. Taylor Swift (5.5 million), Fearless (7.0 million), Speak Now (4.5 million), Red (4.1 million), and 1989 (5.7 million).
Trivia[]
- She has a younger brother, Austin Swift.
- Taylor was raised on a Christmas tree farm.
- She attended her first concert, LeAnn Rimes, when she was eight years old.
- After seeing Faith Hill talk about moving to Nashville on television one day, Swift begged her parents every day nonstop “We need to go to Nashville. Can we please go to Nashville?” They eventually moved to Nashville when she was 11, where Taylor immediately began courting record labels to try landing a deal.
- She helped pass a law to help keep children safe from online predators.
- She initially refused to allow her 1989 album to be streamed through Apple Music as they were not going to pay artists during the first three months of the service going online. Swift felt this was unfair to independent artists who were not financially secure yet. She penned an open letter to Apple, posting it on all her official social media platforms. Within 24 hours, Apple agreed to change their policy based on her stance, and would pay artists their royalties as soon as the streaming service began. Swift announced she would distribute her music with Apple shortly after. Her move was widely considered one of the biggest displays of power and influence from an artist in the entertainment industry.[6]
- During an interview with David Letterman, she stated she learns some phrases in every language of every nation she visits, then demonstrated her impressive ability to speak Japanese. [7]
- Many believe she dissed Harry during the 2013 Grammys, singing "I still love you" in a British accent during a performance of We Are Never Getting Back Together.[8]
- Fans also believe she dissed Harry at the 2013 MTV VMA Awards. During her acceptance speech, she said "I wanna thank the person who inspired this song, who knows exactly who he is". However, Swift was accepting an award for I Knew You Were Trouble, which was written before she began dating Harry and the music video was released while they were still dating.
- She can be briefly seen holding Harry's paper plane necklace in the beginning and end of the music video for Style.
- She wrote Calvin Harris's 2016 hit single This Is What You Came For under the pseudonym Nils Sjöberg. Her vocals briefly appear on the track, alongside main vocalist Rihanna. This information was revealed in July 2016, with confirmation from Swift's representatives, and Harris on his official Twitter.
- Controversy arose in July 2016 when Kanye West and wife Kim Kardashian revealed they had taped Taylor giving West permission to say "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex/I made that bitch famous" on his track "Famous". Swift can be heard warmly thanking Kanye for asking her permission, and planning to tell the media she was aware of the lyric when she would later attend the 2016 Grammy Awards. However, during the actual ceremony, Taylor instead called out Kanye for the lyric, slamming him for "taking credit for" her fame. Taylor responded to the leaked phone call saying she was not informed Kanye would be calling her a "bitch", however she can be heard in the footage saying "You did think you made me famous at the time..." (referencing his controversial interruption of her at the 2009 VMAs), meaning she likely was aware of the lyric in advance.
Gallery[]
External Links[]
- @taylorswift13 - Official Twitter
- @taylorswift - Official Instagram
- Official Tumblr