What We Know About Taylor Swift's Parents' Hush-Hush Divorce
Taylor Swift may have legions of Swifties supporting anything and everything she does, but her ultimate hype people are her parents, Scott and Andrea Swift, also known to fans as Papa and Mama Swift. Their unwavering support has been instrumental to Taylor's rise to fame, even amid rumors they'd separated years ago.
Scott and Andrea were the first-ever Swifties, if you can call them that. According to Taylor, her parents have supported her musical ambitions to become a pop star from the get-go, agreeing to uproot their life from a small town in Pennsylvania to move to Nashville so she could have closer access to record labels. While Taylor did much of the grunt work at the start, like making the rounds on Music Row to get industry professionals to take notice, her former manager, Rick Barker, said her parents' marketing acumen played a pivotal role on her journey to superstardom. "The parents already had her MySpace and her website up and running. The mom and dad both have great marketing minds," he told Entertainment Weekly. "I don't want to say fake it until you make it, but when you looked at her stuff, it was very professional even before she got her deal."
Because Scott and Andrea have always put up a united front for their daughter, fans may be surprised to learn they are officially no longer together. In fact, rumors of their split date back to 2012.
Scott and Andrea Swift reportedly split after 25 years of marriage
While reports of Scott and Andrea Swift's separation only surfaced in 2012, their marital problems apparently began long before that. In an interview with New York Daily News, Ronnie Cremer, the man who claims to have taught Taylor Swift how to play the guitar (and interestingly, helped build her first website), divulged that the pair had a loveless marriage even before the "Cruel Summer" singer became famous.
"They didn't have a good relationship, the mother and father," Cremer claimed. "(Scott) used to tell me... 'I got a wife that doesn't love me. I'm trying to help my daughter out, and do all the right things, and my wife could care less.'" While these insinuations were never confirmed by any of the Swifts, some purported insider info affirmed them. A source told The Star in 2012 that Scott and Andrea, who wed in 1988, had already given up on their marriage, but decided to keep it on the down-low so as not to damage Taylor's reputation. "The Swifts stopped wearing their wedding rings," they noted (via Radar Online). "They haven't filed for divorce because they don't want it to damage Taylor's career... Andrea being on tour with Taylor full-time has really been hard on her relationship with Scott."
Two years later, the two appeared to still be at a crossroads. A report from Page Six claimed that they often butted heads, especially regarding Taylor's career. "They are not on the same page and don't even like to be in the same room," a source divulged. "Andrea requests that her husband not be present at meetings."
Taylor Swift took her parents' separation hard
Taylor Swift may be open about her experiences with heartbreak, but she's notably been careful about commenting on her parents' relationship. According to The Star, however, she had a hard time dealing with their split, so she came to terms with it the best way she knew how — through song. "She's been going through a lot," an insider told the outlet. "The new album will showcase the pain of her parents' separation."
Swifties begged to differ, however, with some coming to the conclusion that Taylor had been alluding to her parents' separation as early as the "Speak Now" album. In the track "Mine," she wrote that she was the "careless man's careful daughter" and that "we'll never make my parents' mistakes." Meanwhile, in "Sad Beautiful Tragic" from the "Red" album, Taylor sang about a relationship falling apart due to distance. Some assume it had been about Jake Gyllenhaal, but fans thought otherwise. "Yes, known [about the divorce] for years," a fan wrote. "Her dad lives in Florida and her mum in Nashville."
Fast forward to 2023, it seems that Scott and Andrea Swift found it in them to become friends again, having been spotted at "The Eras Tour" multiple times being Taylor's biggest cheerleaders, as always.