Over time, great musicians have left a legacy that have danced throughout our living rooms after getting into school, they’ve accompanied our car stereos that saved us from rush hour traffic, we get to experience them on different forms of technology as the music world advances with our ways of consumption and we were extremely fortunate if we ever got to see them perform live, pinching ourselves trying to figure out how it could be real that we could be in the same room as the person we’ve been listening to for so long.
I came to the realization yesterday, that even though I’m going through life with music that the artists I call my home (granted over time I’ll have more music to add to the collection in the back of my mind) will come a time where new music doesn’t exist, whether they stop doing it, whether we suffer the loss of experiencing their death, or weather they pursue different avenues of media, the days of experiencing each new release will have faded into our memory, and all we have left with us is the songs of our past guiding us to a place we once called home.
One of those artists I consider home is Taylor Swift. As an artist who is 10 years older than me, she’s been my songwriting and music inspiration since I was 5/6 years old when the old Taylor could still come to the phone, and as her career blossomed she branched out to different genres, she was still my favorite artist when she was proving that you don’t have to be a one genre type of artist and that being multifaceted is a good thing.
The photo above captures the day when I was 12 going onto 13 years old, I had just been about 10 feet from Taylor as she was making her way to the B stage on the Red Tour. I can remember this moment like it was yesterday, I forced my little self down the stairs and because of how short I was, I got through people quite easily, and she had just turned to make her way to the stage as I had arrived at the bottom of the barricade, but what a rush it was. To be 10 feet away from someone I wanted to be like one day.
To think that there will be a day where new music from her doesn’t exist, is a day that will be when I realize it will be a heartache for me to endure for the rest of my life…because her music and their releases have existed during most of mine.
I like to think about certain events in musical history like Live Aid. It’s a moment where I wish I could’ve been alive and witness Queen, and to see Freddie Mercury in person. Yet to many, he was a musical mystic that our Grandparents and the generations before us had seen with their own eyes. He existed for them. And one day, Taylor Swift will be my Freddie Mercury to the generations that weren’t ever able to witness her greatness.
Long Live the truest Love Story that could have ever been. Thank you for being my most cherished musical enchantress Tay.
Until next time,
-Shelbie
