Taylor Swift is an American singer-songwriter. Her narrative songwriting, which often centers around her personal life, has received widespread critical plaudits and media coverage. Born in West Reading, Pennsylvania, Swift relocated to Nashville, Tennessee in 2004 to pursue a career in country music. Her 2006 eponymous debut studio album was the longest-charting album of the 2000s on the Billboard 200. Its third single, “Our Song”, made her the youngest person to single-handedly write and perform a number-one song on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart.
She was discovered at age 15 by future music mogul Scott Borchetta while performing at a Nashville cafe. Borchetta signed Taylor as the first artist under his newly-formed Big Machine Records. Today she is one of the most-popular and most-successful entertainers on the planet. In some touring years she has easily earned north of $150 million.
With sales of over 200 million records worldwide, Swift is one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Her accolades include ten Grammy Awards, an Emmy Award, and seven Guinness World Records; she is the most-awarded act and woman at the American Music Awards (29 wins) and Billboard Music Awards (23 wins), respectively. She has been included in multiple power rankings, such as Time‘s annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world (2010, 2015, and 2019), Rolling Stone‘s 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time (2015), the Forbes Celebrity 100 (placing first in 2016 and 2019), and Billboard‘s Greatest of All Time Artists Chart (placing eighth). She was named Woman of the Decade (2010s) by Billboard and the Artist of the Decade (2010s) by the American Music Awards, and two of her albums have been listed in Rolling Stone‘s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2020)
