Beth Garrabrant
We would be remiss to make a list of Nashville’s most fascinating people and not include Taylor Swift.
The longtime Nashvillian has pledged her love for her adopted hometown (she and her family moved from Pennsylvania to Hendersonville when Swift was 13) in song, in words, and in action. After the devastating tornados ripped through Middle Tennessee in March, Swift stepped in with a donation of one million dollars in relief money. Shortly after, when Nashville began its stay-at-home order, she provided employees of East Nashville record store Grimey’s New & Preloved Music with money and three months’ worth of health care. Beyond funding, Swift has used her enormous social media reach to encourage her fans to vote, inspiring thousands to register along the way. She’s also a mighty advocate for both women’s rights and songwriters’ rights.
And when she’s not doing her part to make the world a better place through action, she’s doing so through music. Swift surprised pandemic-fatigued fans with a brand-new studio album, Folklore, on July 24. The album debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard charts and sold 846,000 equivalent album units in its first week—the highest first week sales of any album since her own Lover dropped in 2019. And she did it without notice or promotion—all a reminder of the power of Taylor Swift.