Taylor Swift's Singapore connection: Pop star reveals her mum 'spent a lot of her childhood' here

Taylor Swift started the six-night Singapore leg of her The Eras Tour last night (March 2).

Performing over 40 songs from her sophomore album Fearless (2008) to her most recent release Midnights (2022), the 34-year-old serenaded a crowd of over 50,000 during a marathon 3.5-hour set at the National Stadium.

During the Evermore "era", Taylor sang Marjorie, a song dedicated to her maternal grandmother Marjorie Finlay, and shared a connection her family has with Singapore.

"My mum actually spent a lot of her childhood with her mum and dad and sister growing up in Singapore," she revealed while playing gentle chords on the piano.

"So, a lot of the time when we came here on tour, my mum would take me and drive me past her old house and where she used to go to school, and so, I've been hearing about Singapore my whole life."

Taylor had told The Straits Times in a 2014 interview that her maternal grandfather worked for an engineering company and moved the family here for work. 

She said to the concert-goers that it "means the world" for her to play such a big show in Singapore with a crowd that was "essentially honouring" her family by singing along and raising their phones during the song.

"I already love you, we're gonna have a blast tonight," she added.

#SingaporeTSTheErasTour #TaylorSwiftErasTourSG she talked about her past with her grandma in Singapore 🥹 pic.twitter.com/3Kt1r0G8hJ

— soshimood ♕ vs VillainS (@wheeinandout) March 2, 2024

Taylor previously came on tour to Singapore in 2011, 2014 and 2015, but she's not even the first member of her family to perform here — a 1968 article from The Straits Times shows Marjorie herself playing the soprano lead in the opera The Bartered Bride at the Victoria Theatre.

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That wasn't the only Singapore flair shown at the concert, which had coordinated fan-chants and colour-changing wristbands,.

During the song We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together from her album Red (2012), Taylor passed her mic over to backup dancer Kameron Saunders to share a quip. While in Australia it was "yeah, nah" and "naur" to the prospect of getting back together, last night it was a Singlish "no lah!"

Taylor's opening act Sabrina Carpenter also added a Singapore twist to the outro of her song Nonsense.

"Gardens by the Bay I wanna go there / Then I'll take you somewhere that has no hair / Singapore you're so perfect it's no fair," she sang.

SG N1 😫 #SingaporeTSTheErasTour pic.twitter.com/nb7yl0tXAF

— chels 🦌 (@heeseungah15) March 2, 2024

Another highlight of the night included Taylor's song Love Story, where our eyes were peeled on the audience instead of the singer herself. While AsiaOne did not manage to spot any proposals during the romantic number, other concertgoers did.

Calling it the "sweetest love story proposal", a video uploaded by TikTok user Cheekybreakfasts shows two men taking turns getting on their knees to propose to each other.

A lucky girl also got to go on stage and exchange her friendship bracelet with Taylor herself, receiving the singer's hat in return during her song 22. The Straits Times reported that she is 11-year-old Giselle Heng, who has been a fan of Taylor for six years and attended the show with her eight-year-old sister.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkwiByi0fIo[/embed]

Friendship bracelets and enthusiastic crowds

The tradition of exchanging friendship bracelets was started by fans early on in The Eras Tour, and AsiaOne spotted several concertgoers making new friends and giving one another their bracelets prior to the show.

While the concert was seated, a majority of fans — especially those in sections closest to the stage — stood up for the entirety of the 3.5-hour show. Some mothers even carried their children for large sections of the set to let them get a better view.

During Taylor's biggest hits, several audience members surged down the aisles between the seats, with security only managing to usher them back once the songs had finished.

A downside to the enthusiasm, however, was that many concertgoers held their phones and tablets up high to record entire songs, blocking the view of the stage.

Taylor plays her second concert at the National Stadium tonight (March 3), with subsequent shows on March 4 and March 7 to 9. After Coldplay in January, she is the second performer to headline six shows at the venue.

drimac@asiaone.com

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