Chronicling the meteoric rise of one of today's hottest musical stars, this comprehensive biography reveals how Swift has conquered the pop and country music charts, earned a shelf full of awards, and broke multiple chart records--all before turning 20.

This title examines the fascinating life of Taylor Swift. Readers will learn about Swift's childhood, family, and rise to fame. Colorful graphics, oversize photos, and informative sidebars accompany easy-to-read, compelling text that explores Swift's early interest in music and songwriting that led to the release of her albums Taylor Swift, Fearless, and Speak Now, how she deals with success, the MTV Awards fiasco with Kanye West, how her songs relate to her romantic relationships, life on the road, acting, modeling, and merchandising jobs, her philanthropic efforts, and future albums in the works. Features include a table of contents, glossary, selected bibliography, Web links, source notes, and an index, plus a timeline and fun facts. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Essential Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

Taylor Alison Swift (born December 13, 1989) is an American singer-songwriter. Recognized for her songwriting, musical versatility, artistic reinventions, and influence on the music industry, she is a prominent cultural figure of the 21st century. Swift began professional songwriting at age 14 and signed with Big Machine Records in 2005 to become a country singer. Under Big Machine, she released six studio albums, four of them to country radio, starting with her self-titled album in 2006. Her next, Fearless (2008), explored country pop, and its singles "Love Story" and "You Belong with Me" catapulted her to prominence. Speak Now (2010) incorporated rock influences, while Red (2012) experimented with electronic elements and featured Swift's first Billboard Hot 100 number-one song, "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together". She forwent her country image with 1989 (2014), a synth-pop album supported by the chart-topping songs "Shake It Off", "Blank Space", and "Bad Blood". Media scrutiny inspired the hip-hop-flavored Reputation (2017) and its number-one single "Look What You Made Me Do". After signing a new contract with Republic Records in 2018, Swift released the pop album Lover (2019) and autobiographical documentary Miss Americana (2020). She embraced indie folk and alternative rock on her 2020 albums Folklore and Evermore, explored chill-out styles on Midnights (2022), and re-recorded four of her first six albums as "Taylor's Versions" following a dispute with Big Machine. The albums and their number-one songs "Cardigan", "Willow", "All Too Well (10 Minute Version)", and "Anti-Hero" broke various records. In 2023, Swift embarked on the Eras Tour, her most expansive concert tour. She has also directed music videos and films such as All Too Well: The Short Film (2021). Having sold over 200 million records globally, Swift is one of the best-selling musicians, the most-streamed female artist on Spotify, and the only act to have five albums with first-week sales of over one million copies in the US. She has been featured in listicles such as Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time, Billboard's "Greatest of All Time Artists", the Time 100, and Forbes Celebrity 100. Among her accolades are 12 Grammy Awards, including three Album of the Year wins, a Primetime Emmy Award, 40 American Music Awards; 29 Billboard Music Awards; 12 Country Music Association Awards, three IFPI Global Recording Artist of the Year awards, and 101 Guinness World Records. Honored with titles such as Artist of the Decade and Woman of the Decade, Swift is an advocate for artists' rights and women's empowerment.

Taylor Swift is inarguably one of the most successful artists of this generation. She scored her 70th US Hot 100 entry in 2016, and has sold over 130-million singles worldwide, including US#1's We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, Shake It Off, Blank Space and Bad Blood.Taylor has also sold over 40-million albums, including four consecutive Billboard 200 #1's - Fearless, Speak Now, Red and 1989 - and has already won a whopping ten Grammy Awards.

Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Paul Simon-these familiar figures have written road music for half a century and continue to remain highly-regarded artists. But there is so much more to say about road music. This book fills a glaring hole in scholarship about the road and music. In a collection of 13 essays, Music and the Road explores the origins of road music in the blues, country-western, and rock 'n' roll; the themes of adventure, freedom, mobility, camaraderie, and love, and much more in this music; the mystique and reality of touring as an important part of getting away from home, creating community among performers, and building audiences across the country from the 1930s to the present; and the contribution of music to popular road films such as Bonnie and Clyde, Easy Rider, Thelma and Louise, and On the Road.