I suppose I should start off by saying I have been a Taylor Swift fan for about five or six years now. My introduction to her music was the pair of pop crossover hits “Our Song” and “Teardrops On My Guitar,” and since I heard them in high school I have been hooked. It has been interesting to watch Swift go from the sundress wearing, cowboy boots advocate to a full on pop star. Anyone that has listened to her recent songs would simply laugh in your face if you said she is a country artist. While I would argue her songwriting remains somewhat true to the genre she grew up in, and there are a few remnants of country radio pleasing hits in her last album, her love of pop music is completely apparent.
That is something that the country music industry has both accepted and watched very carefully. One prime example of this is last November’s CMA Awards ceremony. For the three awards Taylor was nominated for by herself (album, female vocalist, and entertainer, all major awards), she won zero.
She also went home empty handed at last year’s ACM Awards and the CMA Awards prior to that. At the most recent CMA’s she did go home with one award, though it was not one from the usual categories. The Pinnacle Award is an award created by CMA and given to artists that have ” achieved both national and international prominence through concert performances and record sales at levels unique in Country Music” and it has only previously been awarded to Garth Brooks eight years ago. The award was presented to Taylor by some of the major names in country music, all of whom she has opened for: Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Keith Urban, Brad Paisley, & Rascal Flatts.
To me the presentation just goes to show how she started her career opening up for these artists, and how she has grown to be a larger force than all of them (in the best way possible). What really sparked my interest about how she was received at the awards was a New Yorker article entitled “Taylor Swift Says Goodbye to Country Music?” The two main points the article talks about are:
1: “This year, cynics might suggest that the Pinnacle Award was a gambit to persuade the über-famous Swift to attend the show at all, with the great mid-and late-career heroes of country music corralled into the uncomfortable duty of supplicating before their much younger cash cow. ‘We love you,’ the industry cooed. ‘Don’t leave us.’”
2: “So, despite the absurdity of giving a career-spanning award to an artist in her early twenties, the timing was perhaps just right. With her old idols lined up onstage, it may have been the moment when Swift and the genre that helped steer her toward pop domination said goodbye.”
There are basically two angles to go at this from, either the country music industry was trying to tell her they still appreciate her and don’t want her to leave, or it was more of a farewell, making the point that she wouldn’t be awarded any traditional awards but she was still recognized as having an impact on country music. I think both are very possible.
As this article points out, there are many ways that Taylor could take her next album, and a lot of the options mentioned do not include going more country. If her recent studio pictures with Max Martin and Shellback, as well as her confirmed song with Ryan Tedder, are any indication, her next album will likely be refused the categorization of “country” on iTunes.
The Pinnacle Award could easily be one of the last ways that she is really involved in country music award shows for the next few years. Admittedly it is quite hard to imagine the country world banishing Swift and her enthusiastic dancing from the front rows. She has many admirers and people that protect her in the industry including Vince Gill and Keith Urban, both of whom regularly praise what she has done for the genre. Will their love for her be enough to keep her a part of country?
There are many other factors that contribute to how Swift will be involved in the country music industry, but ultimately the music will truly be the test. We’ll be anxiously awaiting her fifth studio album later this year!