Taylor Swift joked about being “estranged” from Brad Paisley since she opened for him in 2007 due to a “tour prank” gone “too far” while being inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Before launching into her nostalgia-tinged acceptance speech at Music City Center during the organization’s 56th anniversary gala Monday night in Nashville, Tennessee, the “All Too Well” singer recalled how Paisley “filled [her] entire tour bus with live crickets, thousands of them,” per Rolling Stone.
“For months I couldn’t sleep,” Swift, who wore a burgundy velvet dress with an autumnal floral print for the occasion, recalled. “All night I considered buying a pet lizard to eradicate the problem.”
With her induction, the 36-year-old Grammy winner is the youngest artist ever to be inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Other honorees in the 2026 class include Shawn Camp, Bruce Channel, Lyle Lovett and Lee Thomas Miller. George Strait was also honored with the Career Make Award.
During her speech, Swift — who joined Paisley as an opener on his Bonfires & Amplifiers Tour in 2007 — reminisced about her early songwriting years spent in Nashville and noted the recent 20th anniversary of her self-titled debut alum, “Taylor Swift.”
“I started writing songs when I was a little kid and I knew from the time I wrote my first song that even if it couldn’t be my career, it would be my passion,” she said onstage. “It would be what I centered my entire life around.”
Swift said she was “so incredibly honored to be inducted into this sacred club, especially at this point in [her] life.”
“It’s not lost on me how crazy this is,” the “Cruel Summer” singer said. “I will cherish it forever because Nashville is the place that honed and polished the thing about myself and the thing about my life that I am the most proud of and the most passionate about.”
“So to be here with you and to be getting to have this moment, I am truly grateful and it just feels like one of those amazing Nashville moments I’m going to revisit on a rainy day,” she concluded her speech.
Prior to accepting the honor, Lainey Wilson performed a stripped-down version of Swift’s hit song “Love Story.
Earlier this year, Swift made history when she became the youngest woman to ever be indicted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
In her acceptance speech at the June event, Swift tearfully thanked her family — including her parents, Scott and Andrea Swift, and her brother, Austin Swift — for “uprooting their entire lives” to move from Pennsylvania to Nashville, which she called “the songwriting capital of the world,” in support of her music career.
“You’re the reason I am here tonight,” she added.
Following her star-studded wedding to Travis Kelce in July at New York City’s Madison Square Garden, Swift was honored with the inaugural MTV VMAs Artist Director Honors at the 2026 MTV VMAs in September.
At the ceremony, which was held in Los Angeles, Swift debuted her self-directed music video for “Patient Zero.”
The hit was was released as the first single off “The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore,” the deluxe edition of her 2025 album “The Life of a Showgirl.”
