Taylor Swift Ready For Her Final Leg Of The Eras Tour…read more

Taylor Swift News: The Eras Tour Returns to the U.S. on October 18

Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour is heading back to North America after the pop megastar spent much of the past 14 months performing across 16 countries.

She will return to the stage on October 18, kicking off the final leg of her extensive tour in Miami for three consecutive nights.

The 34-year-old is then set to perform multiple concerts in New Orleans, Indianapolis, and Toronto before concluding her record-setting tour in Vancouver on December 8.

She will be joined by newcomer Gracie Abrams, who opened for Swift during the European leg of the tour.

The “Fortnight” singer first announced the additional concert dates in August 2023 a few weeks before what was initially believed to be her final North American performance in Mexico City.

“Turns out it’s NOT the end of an era,” she posted on X (formerly Twitter). Resale tickets are still available on SeatGeek.

WHO IS TAYLOR SWIFT?

Musician Taylor Swift began earning renown as a country singer by age 16 and has since become one of the biggest stars in pop music history.

Early hits like “Love Story” and “You Belong With Me” appealed to country and pop fans alike and helped fuel the multiplatinum success of her albums, including the award-winning Fearless.

Now a pop megastar with 14 Grammys, she is the first artist to win Album of the Year four times.

Named Time’s 2023 Person of the Year, Swift is currently performing on her record-breaking Eras Tour and is dating professional football player Travis Kelce.

The “Shake It Off” and “Anti-Hero” singer released her  latest album, The Tortured Poets Department, in April 2024.

WHERE Is TAYLOR SWIFT FROM?

Taylor Alison Swift was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, on December 13, 1989.

Swift spent her early years with her parents, Scott and Andrea, and brother, Austin, on the family’s Christmas tree farm in nearby Wyomissing.

“I had the most magical childhood, running free and going anywhere I wanted to in my head,” she told Rolling Stone.

She learned to ride horses and competed, but a greater passion soon took root.

Swift followed in the musical footsteps of her grandmother Marjorie Finlay, a professional opera singer.

By age 10, Swift sang at various local events, including fairs and contests. She sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” at a Philadelphia 76ers basketball game at age 11 and began learning guitar and writing her own songs at 12.

(Her songwriting parallels the poetry of her distant cousin Emily Dickinson.) Her early music idols included Shania Twain and The Chicks.

To pursue her music career, Swift often visited Nashville, Tennessee, the country music capital.

There, she co-wrote songs and tried to land a recording contract.

Noting her dedication, her family moved to nearby Hendersonville when she was 13 in an attempt to further young Swift’s career.

She attended Hendersonville High School before finishing her education through the homeschooling program of Aaron Academy, a private Christian school, once her musical career took off.

MUSIC CAREER

One of today’s biggest pop stars, Swift has worked her way from performing at local venues in Tennessee to commanding stadiums full of Swifties—her adoring fans—on international tours.

A stellar performance at The Bluebird Café in Nashville helped her get a contract with Scott Borchetta’s Big Machine Records at age 14.

She spent her early career as a country musician, and her first single, “Tim McGraw,” was named after one of the genre’s biggest stars.

The 2006 song, which she wrote in her first-year math class, became a Top 10 hit on Billboard’s country charts, quickly launching Swift into the spotlight.

McGraw and fellow country music singer Faith Hill even brought Swift on their Soul2Soul tour the next year as an opening act.

Reminiscing on the tour years later, McGraw told ET Canada, “Faith and I both knew that there was no stopping her.

She’s a special talent.”

It wasn’t long before Swift began receiving critical praise for her work.

The teenager won the Horizon Award from the Country Music Association (CMA) and the Academy of Country Music (ACM) Award for Top New Female Vocalist in 2007.

The following year, she was nominated for Best New Artist at the Grammys.

She became the youngest artist to win the Grammy for Album of the Year for Fearless in 2010.

The country music darling eventually began experimenting with genre.

With her fifth album, 1989, she decisively reintroduced herself as a pop musician.

Her new sound excited fans, and the 2014 release is one of her most successful to date, spending 11 weeks atop the Billboard 200 and selling more than 1.2 million copies in its first week.

Not everything about her music changed, though.

Personal experiences, including her romantic relationships, continue to fuel Swift’s songwriting.

“I’m enthralled by relationships, and I love the drama in them, but that’s usually where it lives,” Swift told Rolling Stone in 2009, maintaining “I’m not a dramatic person.”

Hardly the first musician to utilize this practice, the pop star usually doesn’t reveal who her song subjects.

Instead, her loyal fans obsess over easter eggs in her lyrics and music videos to pinpoint a likely person.

Since March 2023, Swift has been performing on her headline-grabbing Eras Tour.

It marks her sixth international tour, having first headlined her own concert series after releasing her sophomore album, Fearless.

When presale tickets for the Eras Tour went live in November 2022, so many fans attempted to snag their seats that Ticketmaster canceled the general sale, leading to a congressional hearing about the debacle.

Already one of the highest-grossing touring musicians as of July 2022, Swift has earned more than $1 billion on the Eras Tour, surpassing Elton John’s record-setting farewell tour that spanned five years.

The Eras Tour wraps in December 2024 after several more concerts across North America.

Swift’s successes in 2023 also include: the release of the 1989 (Taylor’s Version) album, the record-setting concert film Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, two more No. 1 songs on the Billboard Hot 100, tying with Drake as the artist with the most Billboard Music Awards in history, dethroning Bad Bunny as Spotify’s and Apple Music’s most streamed artist of the year, and achieving billionaire status.

All that culminated in Time naming her its 2023 Person of the Year. Swift is the fifth woman to receive the honor.

Early in 2024, Swift became the first artist to win the Grammy for Album of the Year four times, further cementing her place in the history books.

HOW MANY GRAMMYS DOES TAYLOR SWIFT HAVE?

Swift has won 14 Grammy Awards out of 52 nominations.

She was first nominated in 2008 for Best New Artist.

Although Amy Winehouse claimed the honor, 20-year-old Swift lived up to her promising career start by collecting four Grammys the following year.

Fearless won Album of the Year and Best Country Album, and “White Horse” was named Best Country Song and Best Female Country Vocal Performance in 2009.

Swift has now won Album of the Year four times: for Fearless, 1989, folklore, and Midnights.

She is the only artist to have accomplished this feat, setting the record in 2024.

Midnights also won the award for Best Pop Vocal Album this year.

The artist has never won the top song honor of Song of the Year, though she has received a record seven nominations in the category.

As for Best Country Song, Swift has won twice in five nominations; “Mean” earned the trophy the year after “White Horse” did.

The singer-songwriter has won many other accolades, including nine CMA Awards and eight ACM Awards.

Both country music organizations have twice named her Entertainer of the Year.

Since her first in 2009, Swift has taken home 30 MTV Video Music Awards, matching Beyoncé’s record for most wins. Billboard called her Woman of the Year in 2012, one of Swift’s 39 awards from the publication.

She is tied with Drake for as the artist with the most Billboard Music Awards trophies.

In December 2023, Swift notched another first when she received her first Golden Globe Award nomination for Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.

Her concert film competed in but didn’t win Cinematic and Box Office Achievement at the January 2024 ceremony.

HIT SONGS

Since her first single, “Tim McGraw,” in 2006, Swift’s music has found a home on the Billboard charts.

As of October 9, 2024, she has had 264 songs grace the mainstream Hot 100.

That includes 12 No. 1 hits and a record-setting 59 songs in the top 10; no woman has had more top 10 hits, and Swift only trails Drake among all artists.

She also holds nine No. 1 Hot Country Songs, including “Our Song” and “Should’ve Said No.”

Fearless” debuted at No. 9 on the mainstream chart in November 2008, marking Swift’s first top 10 song.

Her first Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper was roughly four years away. That came in September 2012 with Grammy-nominated “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.”

Her other No 1. songs include:

“Shake It Off”

“Blank Space”

“Bad Blood”

“Look What You Made Me Do”

“Cardigan”

“Willow”

“All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)”

“Anti-Hero”

Cruel Summer”

“Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]”

“Fortnight”

At 10 minutes and 13 seconds, “All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)” is the longest No. 1 hit in history. “Shake It Off” is Swift’s only diamond-certified song, having sold the equivalent of 10 million copies.