Taylor Swift and the Work of Songwriting

Abstract

In her 2016 speech accepting the Grammy Award for Album of the Year for 1989, Taylor Swift gave a message directed at any young women who were watching: ‘focus on the work’. Taking Swift’s emphasis on ‘the work’ as a guide, this article surveys Swift’s changing compositional techniques and her reception as a songwriter over the course of her career. Though one of the most-discussed figures in popular culture, there exists little analysis of the musical works that remain the fulcrum of Swift’s artistry and ‘artist-brand’. Gender and genre bias have clouded perception of Swift’s particular skills and techniques. To begin an analysis of the work of Taylor Swift, this article traces her stylistic development through a series of song case studies drawn from successive albums, her collaborations with co-writers and producers, and the 2016 hit by Calvin Harris and Rihanna that was co-written by Swift under a pseudonym, ‘This is What You Came For’. By listening closely to her recorded output, we can hear how a modern songwriter responds to commercial pressures to evolve while retaining a coherent musical identity—and how Swift’s respect for ‘the work’ might motivate her activism around issues of ownership and authorship in the music industry.

Keywords:

• Taylor Swift
• Songwriting
• Labour
• Jack Antonoff
• Authorship
• Max Martin
• Country

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nate Sloan

Nate Sloan is an assistant professor of musicology at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music, and the co-author, with Charlie Harding, of Switched on Pop: How Popular Music Works and Why it Matters (Oxford University Press 2019), based on the podcast of the same name.