Taylor Swift has been inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, becoming its youngest member ever at 36.
The 56th annual gala took place Monday, Oct. 26, at Music City Center in Nashville. Swift signed her first publishing deal in Nashville at 14 and is now a 14-time Grammy winner. This is her second hall of fame honor this year, after her June induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in New York. At the Nashville ceremony, she called the hall a "sacred club."
Who else was inducted? Lyle Lovett, Shawn Camp, Lee Thomas Miller, Bruce Channel, and J.I. Allison, the drummer for Buddy Holly's band The Crickets, joined Swift in the Class of 2026. Miller's credits include "You're Gonna Miss This" and "In Color." George Strait also received the Career Maker Award.
Inducted by Brad Paisley, she opened by joking about a prank he once played on her, filling her tour bus with thousands of live crickets. She said Nashville's songwriters "raised me" and guided her through her early years. She recalled writing after school with Liz Rose in a red-painted upstairs room on Music Row, then heading to a garden shed behind the building where producer Nathan Chapman recorded her songs.
Who performed? Lainey Wilson played a bluegrass version of "Love Story," with fiddle and upright bass.
The Hall of Fame honors writers from every genre and has inducted 254 songwriters since 1970, before this year's class.
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