The Amount Taylor Swift Spent to Buy Back Her Masters Could Be Double What Scooter Braun Paid
Swifties rejoice! Taylor Swift finally owns all of her masters. After a massive journey in re-recording her first six albums, she has complete control.
The “Lover” singer announced that all of her music belongs to her. “To say this is my greatest dream come true is actually being pretty reserved about it,” she wrote in a letter on her website. To my fans, you know how important this has been to me — so much so that I meticulously re-recorded and released 4 of my albums, calling them Taylor’s Version. The passionate support you showed those albums and the success story you turned The Eras Tour into is why I was able to buy back my music. I can’t thank you enough for helping to reunite me with this art that I have dedicated my life to, but have never owned until now.”
Taylor has re-recorded four out of six of her albums: Fearless (released in 2008) and Red (released in 2012), with Fearless (Taylor’s Version) and Red (Taylor’s Version), both released in 2021. She released Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) just before and while on the Eras Tour. Scooter Braun acquired Taylor’s masters in 2019 and sold it for $300 million to a private equity company Shamrock in November 2020.
News of Taylor Swift buying back her masters has been bubbling in the past couple of weeks, but how much was the deal closed for?
How Much Did Taylor Swift Buy Her Masters For?
According to multiple sources to different music media outlets, it’s unclear how much the deal is worth. A source told Rolling Stone that a previously reported price range of close to $600 million, which emerged when rumors of the sale first started circulating, was “highly inaccurate.” Billboard reported that sources alleged that Swift paid $360 million. A source told Page Six that the deal was initially estimated to be around $600 million to $1 billion.
The New York Times reported Braun’s sale of the record label was estimated at $300 million in 2019. Shamrock paid more than $300 million for Swift’s catalog, according to a person briefed on the deal.
With Swift’s earthshattering net worth of $1.6 billion, this sale might have been a piece of cake for the singer. Now, the singer doesn’t have to re-record her remaining two albums Reputation and Taylor Swift.
“Those 2 albums can still have their moments to re-emerge when the time is right, if that would be something you guys would be excited about,” she wrote of Reputation and Taylor Swift. “But if it happens, it won’t be from a place of sadness and longing for what I wish I could have. It will just be a celebration now.”
She gave a transparent update. “I haven’t even re-recorded a quarter of it,” she said. “The Reputation album was so specific to that time in my life, and I kept hitting a stopping point when I tried to remake it. All that defiance, that longing to be understood while feeling purposely misunderstood, that desperate hope, that shame-born snarl and mischief. To be perfectly honest, it’s the one album in those first six that I thought couldn’t be improved upon by redoing it.”
However, hope is not lost at all. “There will be a time (if you’re into the idea) for the unreleased Vault tracks from that album to hatch,” the singer teased.
