Taylor Swift is a certified stadium slayer, but like a true star, she can switch it up and excel in any live format she chooses. This was on full display at her NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert, where she performed solo with just an acoustic guitar in hand, playing her singles “The Man”, “Lover” and “All Too Well”, as well as the deep cut “Death by a Thousand Cuts”.
Swift dropped into the NPR Music HQ in Washington, DC for the appearance, telling the packed room that “Tiny Desk is one of my favorite corners of the internet… It’s an opportunity for artists to choose a different way to showcase their music. I just decided to take this as an opportunity to show you guys how the songs sounded when I first wrote them.” Fans online loved this approach, as 20 million tuned into the NPR Music YouTube channel to hear the stripped-back arrangements.
We all know that Swift delivers live like a boss at every show, and her NPR appearance was no exception. It was a real treat to hear her with just one vocal track and a single guitar, as it highlighted not only her talent as a performer, but also the meaning behind the lyrics in her songwriting.
Swift opened her set with “The Man”, which was the fourth single from her seventh studio album, Lover. Swift told the crowd that Lover “is one of those albums where I wrote everything on one instrument first, so it’s really fun to pick songs to do acoustically because they all started out that way.” Another popular acoustic performance from Swift is her solo rendition of “Blank Space” at The Grammy Museum.
At the NPR HQ, Swift elaborated on the origin of the set opener “The Man”, saying, “There’s a song that I had wanted to write conceptually for a very long time, because over the course of my life it has occurred to me that we have a bit of a double standard issue in our society. It’s something I’ve thought about seven hundred million times a day for the last ten years of my life.”
She then discussed her musings on whether she could write a concise and catchy song on this issue. She stated, “I decided that the most fun thing to do would be to imagine what my life would be like, and what people would say about my life, if I did all the same things, but if I was a man.”
Clearly, this message resonated with fans, as “The Man” peaked at 23 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and was certified Platinum on both sides of the Atlantic. The music video for “The Man” was Swift’s solo directorial debut, and she picked up a Best Direction award for her efforts at the MTV Video Music Awards. This marked the first time a solo female artist had won that category in the history of the event.
If you enjoyed listening to Taylor Swift perform her hits in a stripped back, acoustic setting, don’t forget to follow her on her social media platforms. For more amazing performances, updates and insights into her world, subscribe to her YouTube Channel. Moreover, for a more personalized and behind-the-scenes glimpse of Taylor’s life, don’t forget to give her a like on Facebook. Indulge in Swift’s music and join the millions of Taylor Swift fans across the globe.