Livingston Taylor (born November 21, 1950) is an American singer-songwriter and folk musician. Born in Boston and raised in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, he is the brother of singer-songwriter James Taylor, singer-songwriter Kate Taylor, singer Alex Taylor, and innkeeper and singer Hugh Taylor. Taylor is most notable for his Billboard hits "I Will Be In Love With You", "First Time Love", and "I'll Come Running".
He continues to perform nationally and internationally, and has collaborated with Linda Ronstadt, Jimmy Buffett, Jethro Tull, Carly Simon, and his brother James Taylor. He has been a faculty member at Berklee College of Music since 1989. His mother had been a student at the Music Conservatory in Boston. He was the fourth of five children, his siblings being Alex (1947–1993), James (born 1948), Kate (born 1949), and Hugh (born 1952). His mother, Trudy, recounted that Taylor "was always inventing things". "He and James would make a stringed instrument out of a gourd, or a gut-bucket bass from a broom pole and a washtub, or a flute out of a garden hose, or drums out of cans."
Taylor credits his eldest brother, Alex, for inspiring him, at age 13, to be a musician after Alex returned home one evening having earned $20 performing at a fraternity party. Livingston picked up the guitar and became quite accomplished by age 17.
The Taylor family started vacationing on Martha's Vineyard in the early 1950s, and Livingston has spent every summer there. His parents bought a home there in 1963, and in 1977 Livingston purchased his own 300-square-foot home for $111,000. He refers to the small home as "The Camp".
Around this time, producer Jon Landau suggested to Taylor that he approach the Macon, Georgia-based Capricorn Records founded by Phil Walden and Jerry Wexler. "Carolina Day" peaked at No. 93 on the Billboard Top-100 chart. The debut album included ten originals written by Taylor and one cover: "Six Days on the Road" penned by Earl Greene and Carl Montgomery.
By 1970 Taylor's parents, Ike and Trudy, were legally separated. Several of the Taylor children moved north from North Carolina. Livingston and his then-girlfriend Margaret "Maggie" Shea moved into a cottage in Weston, Massachusetts. It included the song "Get Out of Bed" which peaked at No. 97 on Billboard.
Taylor's third and final album on Capricorn, Over the Rainbow was released in 1973 and features guest vocalists James Taylor and Carly Simon on his original "Be My New Horizon".
Taylor left Capricorn Records and released the first of two albums on Epic Records, Three Way Mirror, in 1978.
During the 1970s, Taylor appeared on several nationally televised variety shows including The Midnight Special, Dinah! (hosted by Dinah Shore), The Mike Douglas Show and American Bandstand.
1980s
In 1980 Taylor released his second album on the Epic label, Man's Best Friend, which was produced by John Boylan and Jeff Baxter. In his album review, Joe Viglione wrote that "Man's Best Friend boasts superb musicianship, high production values, good song selection, beautiful vocal performances from Livingston Taylor, and an impressive cast of guest stars who do not get in the way of the singer/songwriter". Guest vocalists included Carla Thomas and Don Henley.
In 1982, Taylor made an appearance on Late Night with David Letterman.
In 1986, Livingston and his siblings, James, Kate, Hugh, and Alex Taylor played live on the Today Show on Christmas morning.
In 1988, Taylor's first of two children's books, Pajamas, co-written with his wife, Maggie Taylor was published by Harcourt. In her review for School Library Journal, Patricia Dooley wrote "If we knew the tune we could hum along: the lyrics of a children's song make up the text of this bedtime book." She goes on to say that the illustrator "has provided cuddly-looking acrylics, a smug little kid, and a passle of appealing stuffed animals." The following year the album was the winner of the 1989 Boston Music Award for Outstanding Folk Album.
In 1989, he began teaching the class stage performance at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. and the weeknight infotainment program Evening Magazine (produced by WBZ-TV).
1990s
Taylor worked with Traum and Petito again on the 1991 release Our Turn to Dance. In his album review, Jim Worbois wrote: "A talented songwriter in his own right (and most of the album is written or co-written by him) he's a good judge of other people's songs. Two fine examples are 'No Easy Way to Break Somebody's Heart' by Barry Mann (Yup, the "Who Put the Bomp (in the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)" guy) and the Jerome Kern classic 'The Way You Look Tonight.'"
Good Friends, on the Chesky label, was released in 1993. Publishers Weekly also reviewed Can I Be Good?. Diane Roback and Elizabeth Devereaux wrote: "Children will see themselves in the gleeful activities of a golden retriever who finds that it's awfully hard to be good." They go on to say that "Taylor's rhyming prose snaps along merrily, upbeat in tempo yet tinged with wry melancholy that reflects the naughty dog's exasperation."
An album of live concert recordings, Unsolicited Material, again on the Chesky label, was released in 1994. The album "captured the warm-hearted fun of Taylor's concerts and ranged from humorous tunes including Andy Breckman's "Railroad Bill" and "The Dollar Bill Song," a medley of "Songs That Should Never Be Played on the Banjo," and the originals "Jacques Cousteau" and "I Hate Country Music" to heartfelt renditions of Hoagy Carmichael's "Heart and Soul" and Earl Scruggs' "Earl's Breakdown." "Boatman" a song on the Bicycle album was later recorded by his brother James in 1997.
Ink, a collection of R&B cover songs, was released on the Chesky label in 1997.
In 1998, an eighteen track retrospective of the first decade of Taylor's career, Carolina Day: The Livingston Taylor Collection was released. In 1999 a second live album Snapshot: Live at the Iron Horse was released.
A second retrospective was released in 2005 with 20th Century Masters – The Millennium Collection: The Best of Livingston Taylor. Musicians include drummer Steve Gadd, keyboardist Matt Rollings, saxophonist David Sanborn, and bass player Leland Sklar. Taylor's brother, James, and sister, Kate, provide backup vocals on "There I'll Be".
Spiritual overtones are evident on two tracks: Andraé Crouch conducts the New Day Jubilee Gospel Choir on "Step by Step" and the a cappela choir Take 6 helps out on "Tell Jesus (To Come to My House).
Four years later, Taylor released Blue Sky, a collection of both original songs and covers of some pop classics.
The year 2017 marked Taylor's 50th year in the music business. To commemorate this milestone, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker declared January 18, 2017 to be Livingston Taylor Day in Boston. Taylor was recognized for his 50-year music career, as well as being a long-time professor at Berklee College of Music. That evening a party held at the Verb Hotel in Boston was attended by friends and family including Taylor's sister, Kate, niece Sally Taylor, along with Sally's mother, long-time friend, Carly Simon, Don Law, and Norman Chesky. The album was recorded in an abandoned church in Brooklyn, New York with musicians Shelly Berg on piano, David Finck on bass, Bashiri Johnson on percussion and Chelsea Berry providing vocals. Like Taylor's previous album Blue Sky, Safe Home includes original songs as well as show tunes by Rodgers and Hammerstein and others. In his review of the album, Jason Warburg wrote: "That's what the aptly-named Safe Home feels like: an impromptu after-dinner living room concert with Livingston Taylor and friends. Taylor's voice has that rich, unique timbre of New England-by-way-of-North-Carolina that he and his brother James have made famous, lending both his vocals and his superb acoustic guitar picking a sense of instant familiarity and comfort." Cover songs include Paul McCartney's "Penny Lane", Irving Berlin's "Anything You Can Do" and the Everly Brothers "Bye Bye Love". Warburg wrote that the opening song, "I Must Be Doing Something Right", a Taylor original, "has the timeless feel of a Cole Porter tune".
On April 4, 2017, Taylor announced a crowdfunding campaign to help finish a documentary about his life directed by Tracey Anarella to be released in the fall of 2017. Two months after its launch, an update announced that the crowdfunding campaign had been 109% funded. On October 27, 2017, supporters were sent a downloadable link to the finished film and on November 30, 2017, Fish announced a "soft premier" in the Boston area for Wednesday, February 21, 2018, saying additional details would be forthcoming. The film was scheduled to be screened at the 27th Annual Woods Hole Film Festival, Cape Cod's oldest film festival, during the eight-day festival running from July 28 to August 4, 2018.
Taylor began 2018 with a tradition of shows at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton, Massachusetts on January 5 and 6.
On January 9, 2018, Peter Fish, producer of the Life is Good documentary announced that a limited number of tickets would be available at the door for the February 21 premiere of the documentary.thumb|right|Livingston Taylor with a fan at the Stone Soup Coffeehouse in Pawtucket, RI in 2010.
The First Annual Livingston Taylor Retreat was announced in early summer 2018. In addition to Taylor, instructors announced for the retreat include Melissa Ferrick and Vance Gilbert. The retreat was held August 17–19, 2018 at Boston University.
After eleven years teaching at the Berklee College of Music, Livingston wrote a textbook, Stage Performance, which was published by Pocket Books in 2000.Stage Performance was Taylor's first book written for adults, having published two books for children earlier in his career. A revised edition of the book was published in 2011.
Personal life
Taylor married Margaret "Maggie" Shea on May 1, 1976. After 25 years of marriage, they separated in 2001 and the marriage ended in 2003.
Taylor has been a pilot for over 20 years, often making a 40-minute commute from Boston to Martha's Vineyard in his 1964 Cessna 205.
Taylor is the uncle of Ben Taylor, an actor and Indie folk musician.
Discography
Albums
{|class="wikitable"
!Year
!Title
!US
!Record label
|-
| 1970
| Livingston Taylor
| 82
| Capricorn
|-
| 1971
| Liv
| 147
| Capricorn
|-
| 1973
| Over the Rainbow
| 189
| Capricorn
|-
| 1978
| Three Way Mirror
| –
| Epic
|-
| 1979
| Echoes
| –
| Capricorn
|-
| 1980
| Man's Best Friend
| –
| Epic
|-
| 1988
| Life is Good
| –
| Sony
|-
| 1991
| Our Turn to Dance
| –
| Vanguard
|-
| 1993
| Good Friends
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 1994
| Unsolicited Material
| –
|
|-
| 1996
| Bicycle
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 1997
| Ink
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 1998
| Carolina Day: The Livingston Taylor Collection
| –
|
|-
| 1999
| Snapshot: Live at the Iron Horse
| –
| Whistling Dog Records
|-
| 2000
| Live Wires (with Deborah Henson-Conant)
| –
| Bose
|-
| 2005
| The Best of Livingston Taylor
| –
|
|-
| 2005
| There You Are Again
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 2010
| Last Alaska Moon
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 2014
| Blue Sky
| –
|
|-
| 2017
| Safe Home
| –
| Chesky
|-
| 2019
| LIVe – 50 Years of Livingston Taylor Box Set
| –
|
|}
Singles
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|-
! Date
! Title
! US