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      Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour Made a Record $2 Billion of Ticket Sales

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      Over 21 months, the pop superstar’s culture-dominating stage show doubled the gross of its closest competitor, according to ticket sales figures confirmed for the first time.For the last 21 months, Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour has been the biggest thing in music — a phenomenon that has engulfed pop culture, dominated news coverage and boosted local economies around the world.Now we know exactly how big.Through its 149th and final show, which took place in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Sunday, Swift’s tour sold a total of $2,077,618,725 in tickets. That’s two billion and change — double the gross ticket sales of any other concert tour in history and an extraordinary new benchmark for a white-hot international concert business.Those figures were confirmed to The New York Times for the first time by Taylor Swift Touring, the singer’s production company. While the financial details of the Eras Tour have been a subject of constant industry speculation since tickets were first offered more than two years ago — through a presale so in-demand it crashed Ticketmaster’s system — Swift has never authorized disclosure of the tour’s numbers until now.The official results are not far from the estimates that trade journalists and industry analysts have been crunching for months. But they solidify the enormous scale of Swift’s accomplishment. Just a few months ago, Billboard magazine reported that Coldplay had set an industry record with $1 billion in ticket sales for its 156-date Music of the Spheres World Tour — a figure that is just half of Swift’s total for a similar stretch of shows in stadiums and arenas.Every date on the Eras Tour was sold out, and spare tickets were scalped at eye-popping prices — or traded within the protective Swiftie fan community, often at face value.According to Swift’s touring company, a total of 10,168,008 people attended the concerts, which means that, on average, each seat went for about $204. That is well above the industry average of $131 for the top 100 tours around the world in 2023, according to Pollstar, a trade publication.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Best Songs of 2024

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      Listen to 68 tracks that made major statements, boosted big beefs, propelled up-and-comers and soundtracked the party this year.Jon Pareles | Jon Caramanica | Lindsay ZoladzJon ParelesA Little Strife, a Lot of RhythmHere’s a dipperful of worthwhile tracks from the ocean of music released this year. The top of my list is big-statement songs, ones that had repercussions beyond how they sound. Below those, it’s not a ranking but a playlist, a more-or-less guided cruise through what 2024 sounded like for one avid listener. I didn’t include any songs from my list of top albums, which are worth hearing from start to finish. But in the multiverse of streaming music, there are plenty of other possibilities.1. Kendrick Lamar, ‘Not Like Us’Belligerent, accusatory and as tribalistic as its title, “Not Like Us” wasn’t an attack ad from the 2024 election. It was the coup de gras of Kendrick Lamar’s beef with Drake, a rapid-fire, sneering assault on multiple fronts. Its spirit dovetailed with a bitterly contentious 2024.2. Beyoncé, ‘Texas Hold ’Em’“Texas Hold ’Em” isn’t just an invocation of Beyoncé’s home state. It’s a toe-tapping taunt at the racial and musical assumptions behind country music as defined by record labels and radio stations. Rhiannon Giddens picks an oh-so-traditional claw-hammer banjo intro and Beyoncé — raised in Texas — promises “a real-life boogie and a real-life hoedown,” singing about drinking and dancing and daring gatekeepers to hold her back.3. Sabrina Carpenter, ‘Please Please Please’Sabrina Carpenter delivers a sharp message on the slick “Please Please Please.”Nina Westervelt for The New York TimesComedy is tricky in a straight-faced song, but Sabrina Carpenter’s eye-roll comes clearly through the shiny pop of “Please Please Please.” The singer tries to placate and possibly tame a boyfriend who sounds more obnoxious in every verse. “I beg you, don’t embarrass me,” she coos; eventually she reaches a breaking point.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Angela Alvarez, Great-Grandmother Who Won a Latin Grammy, Dies at 97

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      Her only album made her a media star after she had raised four children and worked as a house cleaner — proving, she said, that “it’s never too late.”Angela Alvarez, a Cuban-born singer and songwriter who, at age 95, became the oldest performer to win the Latin Grammy Award for best new artist, died on Friday in Baton Rouge, La., where she had settled after immigrating to the United States in the early 1960s. She was 97.Her death was confirmed by her grandson Carlos Jose Alvarez. Mr. Alvarez, a film composer, produced his grandmother’s first and only album, “Angela Alvarez,” released in 2021. Its 15 tracks echo the sounds of a Havana nightclub in the 1930s or ’40s — a jazzy fusion of Caribbean, African and European rhythms.Sitting with her grandson at the Latin Grammy Awards ceremony in 2022, Mrs. Alvarez was stunned when she heard her name. (The vote was actually a tie: She shared the award with the Mexican singer and songwriter Silvana Estrada, 70 years her junior.)“I looked at him, and I said, ‘Carlos, that’s me!’” she told the Baton Rouge lifestyle magazine inRegister. “I couldn’t believe it.”She became a media star, with English- and Spanish-language publications chronicling her long and improbable journey to the awards stage after raising four children and working as a house cleaner.“Although life is difficult, there is always a way out, and with faith and love you can achieve it, I promise you,” Mrs. Alvarez said as she accepted the award. “It’s never too late.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      For Taylor Swift, It’s the End of the ‘Eras’

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      Anyone with an ear tuned to the world of pop music knew the Eras Tour was going to be a big one.It was Taylor Swift’s first tour in almost five years, the longest gap of her career. And Swift, long the biggest star in pop music, had become even bigger, transcending the Top 40 to become a cultural phenomenon.Moreover, this tour would include extensive music, not just from her most recent album, “Midnights,” but from her entire career, from the country of “Fearless” to the pop of “1989” to the indie pop of “Folklore.”The first concert came in March 2023 in Glendale, Ariz., and it was even bigger than anyone imagined: three hours, 15 minutes without intermission and more than 40 songs.And the excitement just kept building, with frenzied anticipation in every city, attendance records broken and vast economic impacts in regions and even entire countries.Tickets vanished in seconds, then quickly popped up on the secondary market at 10 times the price. Fans who couldn’t obtain or afford tickets came to the venues anyway, content to commune with others like them and sing along with the amplified music coming from inside.Now, almost two years later, the tour is coming to an end on Sunday night in Vancouver, Canada.The atmosphere outside the concert venue on Saturday night was friendly and bubbly.Alana Paterson for The New York TimesHayley Pallin from Oregon came with her family to watch the concert.Alana Paterson for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      1984: The Year Pop Stardom Got Supersized

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      Forty years ago, the chemistry of pop stardom was irrevocably changed. Nineteen eighty-four was an inflection point: a year of blockbuster albums, career quantum leaps, iconic poses and an enduring redefinition of what pop success could mean for performers — and would then demand from them — in the decades to come.The indelible albums of 1984 were turning-point releases: Prince’s “Purple Rain,” Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” and Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” among them. Tina Turner reintroduced herself as a bruised but resilient survivor on “Private Dancer.” And Van Halen proved that hard rock could mesh with pop — even synth-pop — on “Jump.” These were pivotal statements from established acts who were decisively multiplying their impact.Those blockbusters were propelled by an unlikely convergence of artistic impulses, advancing technology, commercial aspirations and popular taste, all shaped by the narrow portals of the pre-internet media landscape. The eye-popping novelty of music videos, the dominance of major record labels and the cautious formats of radio stations still made for a limited, recognizable mainstream rather than the infinitude of choices, niches, microgenres and personalized recommendation engines that the internet opened up. It was a peak moment of pop-music monoculture. Listeners in the 1980s absorbed hits that felt like ubiquitous earworms: the fanfare-like synthesizer riff of “Born in the U.S.A.,” the saxophone cushioned by synthesizers in George Michael’s “Careless Whisper,” the drone and percussion and bawled vocals of “Shout” by Tears for Fears. Younger generations have definitely heard and seen their repercussions, whether or not they’ve played back the originals. The sounds and lessons of 1984 have been durable and widely recycled by countless synthesizer-pumped 21st-century hitmakers, among them the Weeknd (“Blinding Lights”) and Sabrina Carpenter (“Please Please Please”). More

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      Is the Real ‘Wicked’ Movie the Press Tour?

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      Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon MusicThe film adaptation of the Broadway musical “Wicked” has been long in the works and perhaps anticipated for even longer. Starring Ariana Grande (billed as Ariana Grande-Butera) as Galinda and Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, it is an ornate adventure that serves as a sort of prequel to “The Wizard of Oz.” (It is also the first of two films; the second one will be released next November.)Grande and Erivo have been praised for their performances onscreen, but they have also been performing in a parallel show, making viral magic on the press tour. The result has been a film rollout that at times feels louder than the film itself.On this week’s Popcast, a conversation about how “Wicked” survived the transition from stage to film, how Grande and Erivo inscribed new narrative into their roles, and how the real film may well be Grande and Erivo’s public appearances.Guest:Joe Coscarelli, The New York Times’s pop music reporterConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica.Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. More

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      Cash App Wades Into the Exclusive World of Presale Concert Tickets

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      Legacy credit cards and banks aren’t the only banking options to come with perks for premium access to events anymore.When Kendrick Lamar and SZA announced a joint tour this week, there were no American Express, Citibank or Capital One presale codes in sight. Instead, fans reached for the digital payments platform Cash App, and some even dropped their handles across social media in hopes that someone would donate to their ticket funds.Legacy brands aren’t the only banking options to come with such perks as early access to performances anymore.For their Grand National tour, which will be debuting in the spring, SZA and Lamar partnered with Cash App for early access, the latest move by the payment platform to try to open up what has become an exclusive ticket-access process.The “Grand National Tour” poster for the tour of Kendrick Lamar and SZA, featuring Cash App as one of the partners. “Everyone should have access to the financial system, and that includes the rewards that come along with premium credit cards,” said Catherine Ferdon, the chief marketing officer for Cash App. “Most artists don’t really care what their fans’ credit score is or if they carry a luxury credit card in their wallet. They care that their fans love their music and can get access to it easily.”Generally, the credit cards that grant access for concert presales come with “pretty significant barriers to entry,” Ms. Ferdon said, including high annual fees, credit score requirements, and qualifying for a high credit limit. Cash App acts like a prepaid debit card and does not require users to have a bank account or credit approval. A physical Cash App card was required for the presale.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Kennedy Center’s Chairman Won’t Depart After All

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      As the nation’s capital prepares for a second Trump administration, the performing arts center announced that its chairman would not step down in January as planned.The White House was not the only Washington institution planning to welcome new leadership in January. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts had announced that its longtime board chairman, David M. Rubenstein, would step down in January and had appointed a search committee to find a successor.But last month, shortly after the presidential election, the Kennedy Center announced that Mr. Rubenstein, a private equity titan who has led its board of 14 years, would stay on in the position until September 2026.The decision ensures continuity at a moment when the Kennedy Center, like much of Washington, is preparing for a second Trump administration. (On Sunday, President Biden is expected to attend the Kennedy Center Honors as it celebrates Francis Ford Coppola, the Grateful Dead, Bonnie Raitt and Arturo Sandoval; President-elect Donald J. Trump did not attend the ceremonies during his first term.) But it also raises questions about why the center failed to find a new chair.Deborah F. Rutter, the center’s president, said that on Nov. 15 the board’s search committee decided to keep Mr. Rubenstein on in part because the center is in the quiet phase of an endowment campaign, making a leadership transition “really tough.”“We looked at the needs of the Kennedy Center in a variety of different ways moving forward,” she said in an interview. “It is important for us to have somebody who knows the center and who knows and can play the leadership role that we need.”Mr. Rubenstein, a co-founder and co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, a private equity firm, has given the center $111 million over the years. He was initially appointed by former President George W. Bush. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More