Taylor Swift Performs at Star-Studded Academy Museum Gala 2026
See Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce Step Out in NYC for Low-Key Date Night During Chiefs Bye Week
Taylor Swift would like to thank the Academy for an enchanted evening.
The “Fortnight” singer took the stage for one of Hollywood’s biggest nights, performing at the sixth annual Academy Museum Gala at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles Oct. 17.
The night was a celebration of the movies, co-chaired by Tom Ford, Robert Rodriguez, Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw as they honored John Carpenter, Colman Domingo and Charlize Theron.
Of course, it was also a big night for Swift as she fearlessly wowed the crowd with a night they’ll remember all too well, giving a live performance of her song “I Knew It, I Knew You” from Toy Story 5, where she was accompanied by background singers and saxophonists.
Indeed, the Grammy winner ditched the baby blue Dior gown she wore earlier in the evening to walk the red carpet for a sparkling cobalt dress as she dominated the stage in front of Hollywood’s biggest stars.
And to no one’s surprise, it seems T-Swift is your favorite celebrity’s favorite celebrity as Connor Storrie and Rosé were just two stars seen jamming out as she sang her 2014 hit “Blank Space.”
But the performance didn’t stop there. After all, Swift proved the old Taylor could come to the phone as she serenaded more stars including Kim Kardashian and Sabrina Carpenter with a guitar while singing her 2008 track “Love Story.”
Keeping the good vibes going on the land, the sea, the sky, Swift also performed "The Fate of Ophelia" from her latest album The Life of a Showgirl.
Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Oscars/Getty Images for Academy Museum Foundation
Swift’s appearance was first announced by the Academy on Oct. 8, with Director and President of the Academy Museum and Academy Collection Amy Homma sharing in a statement, “Taylor is an extraordinary talent whose work resonates around the world.”
While the “Opalite” singer has yet to be nominated for an Oscar for the Toy Story 5 song, her work on “I Knew It, I Knew You” has certainly been part of the awards season buzz.
And as Swift previously shared, having the chance to be part of a film franchise she’s loved since childhood made her feel like she never had to grow up.
Photo by Amy Sussman/Getty Images
“I’ve always dreamed of getting to write for these characters who I’ve adored since I was a 5 year old kid watching the first Toy Story movie,” she wrote on Instagram in June. “I fell instantly in love with Toy Story 5 when I was lucky enough to see it in its early stages, and I wrote this song as soon as I got home from the screening. Sometimes you just know, right?”
She broke down her writing process in a video posted a few weeks later, saying, “Been kind of a hectic day. At 11 a.m., went to go see Toy Story 5, got so inspired, got the songwriter zoomies, went home, wrote the end credit song for Toy Story 5. We have now produced it, and I’m doing vocals. It’s 6:57 p.m.”
Swift noted that former Disney CEO Bob Iger was set to hear the song in just a few hours, raving, “I think this is one of the most fun days of my life.”
For a deep dive into every fascinating fact about the singer, keep reading.
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1. While Taylor Swift writes all of her own music, she specifically wrote her entire Speak Now album all by herself. No co-writers, just her. The album was released in Oct. 2010, when Taylor was just 20.
2. She grew up on a Christmas tree farm with her family in Pennsylvania. She references her time there on her holiday song of the same name.
3. She's named after James Taylor. That's right, from one music legend to another.
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4. She's a former Abercrombie model. Just like fellow stars Channing Tatum, Jennifer Lawrence, Emma Roberts and Ashton Kutcher, T.Swift modeled for the company in 2003.
5. She gave Eric Church her first gold record. Back in 2006, she joined Rascal Flatts on their tour after Church was fired. "Actually, she called me after I got fired. I read in the paper that we were fired. She called and said 'I want you to know that I love what you do,'" Church previously told the Arizona Daily Star. "I joked with her, 'This is your crowd; they're going to love you. You're going to owe me your first gold record.' I was kidding, but when she got her first gold record she gave me one. It came with a note: 'Thanks for playing too long and too loud on the Flatts tour. I sincerely appreciate it. Taylor.'"
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6. She has doubled-jointed elbows. During her 2016 Vogue 73 questions video, Taylor was asked if she has any "really cool or bizarre" talents. In response, she said, "OK, I'm well aware that this is not a talent, but this is like the only thing that I can do. I have double-jointed elbows."
7. Her drink of choice? Vodka and Diet Coke, as revealed in that same Vogue video.
8. She turned off her comments on social media to "block some of the noise." In her essay for Elle, entitled "30 Things I Learned Before Turning 30," Taylor explained, "social media can be great, but it can also inundate your brain with images of what you aren't, how you're failing, or who is in a cooler locale than you at any given moment. One thing I do to lessen this weird insecurity laser beam is to turn off comments. Yes, I keep comments off on my posts. That way, I'm showing my friends and fans updates on my life, but I'm training my brain to not need the validation of someone telling me that I look [fire emojis]."
Stephen Lovekin/Variety/Shutterstock
9. She was originally going to name her seventh studio album Daylight before landing on Lover. But since the album was the follow-up to reputation, the singer thought the name Daylight would be a little too on the nose. So, when Taylor wrote the song "Lover," she decided that would be the name of the album.
10. She's the youngest solo artist to win Album of the Year. T.Swift was just 20 when she won the top honors in 2010 for her beloved album, Fearless.
NBC
11. Taylor made history at the 2024 Grammys, becoming the first female artist to win Album of the Year four times. (For Fearless, 1989, Folklore and Midnights.)
12. The singer's album, Lover, sold over 1 million pure copies in the United States in its first few months alone, according to Chart Data. This was the first album to reach this milestone in 2019.
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13. More historic milestones! At the 2019 American Music Awards, Taylor surpassed Michael Jackson's record to become the most awarded artist at the AMAs.
14. As a child, Taylor wanted to be a stockbroker, just like her dad! But she went on to find her true calling in music, later moving from Pennsylvania to Tennessee with her family to kick off her career.
15. She learned to play guitar around the age of 12 after learning a few chords from a technician who was fixing her computer. She then went on to write her first song, "Lucky You."
Getty Images for Entercom
16. She's "obsessed" with Phoebe Waller-Bridge. While talking about her love for Fleabag, Taylor told Entertainment Weekly, "She makes you crack up, shocks you, and breaks your heart all in the span of a few minutes in that show." Taylor later performed on the SNL episode which the Amazon Prime star hosted!
17. She wrote her own monologue for her appearance on Saturday Night Live in 2009, which doesn't usually happen with celeb guests. Taylor clearly impressed the team with "Monologue Song (La La La)."
18. She's been BFFs with Selena Gomez since their respective relationships with the Jonas Brothers. (ICYMI, SelGo even supported her best friend in Nov. 2021 when she returned to SNL to perform the 10-minute version of "All Too Well.") Back in 2008, Taylor spent time with Joe Jonas, while Gomez dated his younger brother, Nick Jonas. The two quickly became close pals, and have remained tight to this day. Taylor even offered to be the flower girl in Gomez's wedding to fiance Benny Blanco.
Larry Busacca/Getty Images for NARAS
19. Remember the "redhead named Abigail" that Taylor references in "Fifteen," her beloved song about growing up? Well, she and Taylor are still BFFs, too! Abigail Anderson is her name, and Taylor was a bridesmaid in her wedding in 2017.
20. She's a godmother, holding that distinction for pal Jaime King's son Leo Thames and BFF Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds' daughters James, Inez and Betty.
Dave Hogan
21. Taylor has said that she may never perform her song "Soon You'll Get Better," which is about her mother's cancer battle. During a Q&A session in Aug. 2019, as part of a SiriusXM Town Hall special, she shared, "It was hard to write, it's hard to sing. It's hard to listen to for me, but sometimes music is like that."
22. She doesn't have X, formerly known as Twitter, on her phone. In an interview with Billboard, Taylor explained, "Sometimes, when I open Twitter, I get so overwhelmed that I just immediately close it. I haven't had Twitter on my phone in a while because I don't like to have too much news. Like, I follow politics, and that's it. But I don't like to follow who has broken up with who, or who wore an interesting pair of shoes. There's only so much bandwidth my brain can really have."
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23. She's never been to therapy. "I talk to my mom a lot, because my mom is the one who's seen everything," Taylor told Rolling Stone in Sept. 2019. "God, it takes so long to download somebody on the last 29 years of my life, and my mom has seen it all."
Kevin Mazur/WireImage
24. According to an interview, her favorite lyrics off of her Lover album are, "Ladies and gentlemen, will you please stand? / With every guitar string scar on my hand/I take this magnetic force of a man to be my lover."
25. Taylor is a billionaire! According to an Oct. 2024 report published by Bloomberg, after breaking records in the industry for over a decade, Taylor's Eras Tour helped her achieve billionaire status.
26. The 2019 Netflix film, Someone Great, inspired her music, "I cried watching the movie. For about a week, I start waking up from dreams that I'm living out that scenario—that that's happening to me," she told Elvis Duran during an interview. "I'd have these lyrics in my head based on the dynamics of these characters and I went in the studio with Jack Antonoff." The studio session led to the creation of Taylor's song, "Death By a Thousand Cuts."
27. She has a special place for her most emotional songs. From "All Too Well" to "The Archer," the superstar reserves the fifth spot on her albums for a ballad.
28. She's over hiding from cameras: In fact, she's proudly supported fiancé Travis Kelce at NFL games since 2023. “When you say a relationship is public, that means I’m going to see him do what he loves, we’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care,” she told Time. “The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other."
Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
29. Speaking of Travis, when Taylor and the NFL star announced their engagement on Instagram in Aug. 2025, it made history on the platform, with Billboard—citing date from Meta—reporting that it received over a million reposts.
30. The engagement also helped inspire Cambridge Dictionary’s 2025 word of the year, "Parasocial."
31. Taylor made history following the Oct. 2025 release of her album, The Life of a Showgirl, which sold 2.7 million copies in its first day of release, according to the AP.
32. Oh, and the album went on to sell 4 million copies in its first week alone.
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33. In The End of an Era, her Disney+ docuseries, Taylor said that two factors led to the creation of The Eras Tour: The sale of her masters and the pandemic.
34. After a years-long battle, Taylor shared in May 2025 that she'd obtained the master recordings of her first six albums.
"That's how I spent that Eras Tour money," Taylor shared on The Stephen Colbert Show Dec. 10. "My fans are why I was able to get my music back."
35. Taylor and her Eras band rehearsed surprise songs "quietly" on the tour so that fans outside the stadiums wouldn't hear.
36. At the end of each leg of the Eras Tour, Taylor gifted her crew bonuses, her docuseries confirmed.
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