Taylor Swift, Sir Elton John and Eurovision: The biggest music moments in 2023

From Taylor Swift’s record-breaking year to Lewis Capaldi’s moving performance at Glastonbury, 2023 has been one to remember in the music business.

Here’s a pick from the PA news agency of some of the biggest musical moments from the past year.

– Taylor Swift’s tour

Taylor Swift has dominated the music industry in 2023 and broken records left, right and centre – going as far as breaking a Guinness World Record for the highest-grossing music tour ever with The Eras Tour which became the first to surpass one billion US dollars in revenue.

A homage to Swift’s 10 studio albums with songs spanning the entirety of her career, the ongoing tour, which kicked off in Glendale, Arizona in March, is her most expansive to date with over 150 shows in stadiums across the globe.

She even took The Eras Tour to the big screen in cinemas around the world – with the concert film generating the highest ticket sales at the UK and Ireland box office on its opening day, according to Vue International.

Alongside her mammoth tour, Swift, 34, has also been releasing new music in the form of her re-recorded albums.

Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) dropped in July along with six previously unheard tracks “from the vault”, while 1989 (Taylor’s Version) launched in a similar fashion in October – with the latter claiming the biggest opening week for any album released this year.

– Eurovision in Liverpool

Eurovision fans from across the world gathered in Liverpool in their thousands earlier this year for the international song competition, hosted on behalf of last year’s winners Ukraine.

One UK fan told PA it was a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to be able to watch the contest on home soil, while those travelling from overseas expressed how the reception in the northern city had been “amazing” and “felt like home”.

Loreen of Sweden won the Eurovision Song Contest for the second time, making history as the first woman, and only the second person, to win the competition twice.

In this year’s event which was held at Liverpool’s M&S Bank Arena, Loreen, 40, performed her dance-pop song Tattoo which bagged her the trophy with 583 points, narrowly beating Finland’s Kaarija who scored 526.

In 2012, her song Euphoria also saw her storm the competition which means she equals the record held by Irish singer Johnny Logan, who triumphed at the contest in both 1980 and 1987.

Upon winning the award, Loreen said: “This is overwhelming. I’m so happy and I’m so thankful.”

– Sir Elton John’s farewell

Sir Elton John brought a close to his touring career earlier this year after spending over 50 years on the road.

Since the launch of his first tour in 1970, the 76-year-old megastar has played more than 4,000 performances in over 80 countries, including the Sunday headline slot at Glastonbury Festival in June.

The final show of his highly anticipated Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour took place in Stockholm, Sweden, at the Tele2 Arena in July where he performed 23 of his hit songs during the two-and-a-half-hour-long set.

Sir Elton thanked his fans, saying “I wouldn’t be sitting here if it wasn’t for you”, adding that they were in his “head, heart and soul”.

The monumental concert tour, which set off in 2018, was one of the highest-grossing since records began, with Billboard reporting it was the first to collect 900 million US dollars (£701 million) in ticket sales.

– Lewis Capaldi’s emotional Glastonbury performance

Lewis Capaldi made headlines over the summer after playing an emotional performance at Glastonbury, where the crowd at the festival’s Pyramid Stage carried him through his set as he steadily lost his voice.

While performing his hit track Bruises, the 27-year-old Scottish star admitted he was having voice issues and asked the audience to “sing with me as loud as you can” – to which the crowd at Glastonbury delivered.

Capaldi finished his set with his Grammy-nominated track Someone You Loved and became emotional as the audience chanted the lyrics back to him as he struggled to sing some of the notes.

Following his appearance at the Somerset festival, Capaldi announced on social media that he would be taking a break from touring “for the foreseeable future”, writing online that he was “still learning to adjust to the impact of my Tourette’s”.

The singer-songwriter also made waves this year with his Netflix documentary titled Lewis Capaldi: How I Live Now, which won an award at the National Television Awards (NTA) in September.

In the documentary, which released back in April, Capaldi opened up about his mental health struggles and shared how the pressures of fame had impacted him.

After earning an NTA in the authored documentary category, Capaldi said in a video message that it “means the world”, adding: “It never ceases to blow me away how much this documentary has connected with people and struck a chord.”

– New music from the Beatles

The Beatles made history this year by topping the UK singles chart a record 54 years since their previous number one with their track titled Now And Then.

The song, which was described as the Beatles’ last track, was written and sung by John Lennon in a private recording in the late 1970s and later developed by the other band members, including George Harrison.

It was then finished by Sir Paul McCartney and Sir Ringo Starr and released in November, decades after the original recording with technology used to extract and isolate Lennon’s vocals.

It comes more than five decades since The Beatles last reached number one with The Ballad of John and Yoko in 1969, with no other act in UK music history having such a long gap between two chart-toppers.

Sir Paul McCartney, one of the two surviving Beatles, described the news as “mind-boggling”, telling the Official Charts Company: “It’s blown my socks off. It’s also a very emotional moment for me. I love it!”