Livingston Taylor

Livingston Taylor (born November 21, 1950) is an American singer-songwriter and folk musician. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, and raised in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, he is the brother of singer-songwriter James Taylor, singer-songwriter Kate Taylor, musician Alex Taylor (d. 1993), and innkeeper and singer Hugh Taylor. With a career reaching the fifty year mark in 2017, 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 over 75 shows a year, nationally and internationally, having shared the stage with performers such as Linda Ronstadt, Jimmy Buffett, and Jethro Tull. In addition, he has been a faculty member at Berklee College of Music since 1989. Childhood : Taylor was born to parents Isaac M. "Ike" Taylor and Gertrude "Trudy" Taylor in Boston, Massachusetts. He grew up in North Carolina when his father, a physician, accepted a position at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 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). At an early age Taylor had a repertoire of folk songs. "From his high chair in the kitchen, little Liv memorised the radio jingle for snuff, chanting 'If your snuff's too string, it wrong. Get Tuberose.'" 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." Family sing-a-longs took place as a way for Trudy to pass the time while her husband was away. During those early family musical performances, James played cello, Alex played violin, Kate dulcimer, and Livingston banjo. As recounted by James, "We sang African songs, union songs, folk hymns and radio jingles. Leadbelly, Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie and The Weavers were the records we most listened to. It was their mother, Trudy, who was the catalyst for the children to create their own songs. One day while in the kitchen, she held up a can of vegetables saying: "Why don't you invent an ad jingle about this can of food?" "Alex, James, and Livingston took up their banjo, cello and harmonica and began to improvise some musical sloganeering as Kate and Trudy joined in." These impromptu performances were christened the "kitchen concerts" by Trudy. They would continue until the children were old enough to leave home for their secondary education at boarding schools. As a child, according to his mother, Taylor would fill baskets in his room with rocks he had collected.When Livingston was eight, his mother took he and his siblings to Europe, crossing the Atlantic on the New Amsterdam. Their father, Ike, met them in Europe and they all returned home on the Ile De France. During part of that trip, however, Livingston and his younger brother Hugh were placed in a youth hostel in Switzerland while his parents and older siblings enjoyed a two-week trip to Italy. Livingston said he hated it there and prayed every night that his parents would return and rescue he and Hugh. At around the same age, Livingston was developing into a "literate personality" as evidenced by a letter he wrote to his father who was away from home at the time. Ike wrote back to his son saying: "I can hardly believe that you can write." 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 on the Vineyard for $111,000. He refers to the small home - that sits near a freshwater pond - as "The Camp".