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Starlight

RED (2012) | RED (Taylor's Version) [2021]

“Starlight” is track fifteen on Taylor’s fourth studio album, RED (2012). She wrote the song about the romantic adventures of Ethel and Bobby Kennedy after coming across a photo of the pair dancing when they were teenagers. The re-recording of the song, “Starlight (Taylor’s Version),” was released on November 12, 2021, on RED (Taylor’s Version).

Background and Lyrical Theme

“Starlight” is about Ethel and Bobby Kennedy, who are the grandparents of Conor Kennedy, whom Taylor was dating while writing for RED. She became especially close to Ethel Kennedy during their relationship. Taylor wrote the song alone and co-produced it with regular collaborator Nathan Chapman and Dann Huff. She has said the following on the song’s meaning:

«'Starlight' is a song I wrote after seeing a picture of Ethel and Bobby Kennedy when they were seventeen. I saw this picture about a year and a half ago, and I didn’t know anything about what they were doing or what was going on in the picture, but I just thought, ‘They look like they’re having the best night.’ And so I wrote this song about what the night might’ve been like. I ended up meeting Ethel and going and playing it for her, and she just loved it. It was such a fun moment when she was just in love with the song and so happy about it. It’s just this adorable picture that to me, it brought forth all these potentials for how that night could’ve been.»

Taylor Swift

She also told The Wall Street Journal: “I get a lot of style inspiration from the 1960s, so I’ll go and look at black and white pictures, and look at photos from the ‘50s and ’60s, and I came across this picture of these two kids dancing at a dance. It immediately made me think of like how much fun they must have had that night. It was back in the late ’40s. I ended up reading underneath that it was Ethel Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. And they were, like, 17. So I just kind of wrote that song from that place, not really knowing how they met or anything like that. And then her daughter Rory ended up coming to a show a couple weeks later and I told her about the song and she was like, ‘You have to meet my mom, she would love to meet you.’ So that was kind of what that song was about.”

Live Performances

Taylor first performed “Starlight” during the “Ripple of Hope Gala,” which is hosted by the Kennedy family and was held on December 3, 2012, in New York City. She didn’t include the song on the regular setlist for “The RED Tour” (2013-2014). However, she performed the track as the acoustic surprise song twice: the first time being in Newark (New Jersey) on March 27, 2013, and the second being her show in Glendale (Arizona) on May 29, 2013. Taylor again performed “Starlight” as an acoustic surprise song during her “reputation Stadium Tour” show in Brisbane (Australia) on November 6, 2018. It was also chosen as the first surprise song for her “The Eras Tour” show in Denver on July 15, 2023. Taylor performed a mashup of “Starlight” with “Mine” (2010) during her “Eras Tour” show in Singapore on March 2, 2024.

Taylor's Version

On August 6, 2021, Taylor announced that a re-recorded version of “Starlight”, titled “Starlight (Taylor’s Version)”, would be included as the sixth track on her second re-recorded album RED (Taylor’s Version), which was released on November 12, 2021, through Republic Records.

Taylor by Taylor Swift: Made of Starlight

Taylor used “Starlight” in the commercials for her third fragrance, Taylor by Taylor Swift (2013) and even named its spin-off after the song: Taylor by Taylor Swift: Made of Starlight (2014). The perfume originally came in a musical box that played the song “Starlight”.

Lyrics

[Intro]
I said, “Oh my, what a marvelous tune”
It was the best night
Never would forget how we moved
The whole place
Was dressed to the nines
And we were dancing, dancing
Like we’re made of starlight (Like we’re made of starlight)

[Verse 1]
I met Bobby on the boardwalk
Summer of ’45
Picked me up late one night
Out the window we were seventeen
And crazy, running wild, wild
Can’t remember what song it was playing when we walked in
The night we snuck into a
Yacht club party, pretending to
Be a duchess and a prince

[Chorus 1]
And I said, “Oh my, what a marvelous tune”
It was the best night
Never would forget how we moved
The whole place
Was dressed to the nines
And we were dancing, dancing
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight

[Verse 2]
He said, “Look at you, worrying too much about things you can’t change.
You’ll spend your whole life singing the blues if you keep thinking that way.”
He was trying to skip rocks on the ocean, saying to me,
“Don’t you see the starlight, starlight? Don’t you dream impossible things?”

[Chorus 2]
Like, “Oh my, what a marvelous tune”
It was the best night
Never would forget how we moved
The whole place
Was dressed to the nines
And we were dancing, dancing
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight

[Bridge]
Ooh ooh, he’s talking crazy
Ooh, ooh, dancing with me
Ooh, ooh, we could get married
Have ten kids and teach them how to dream

[Guitar Solo]

[Final Chorus]
“Oh my, what a marvelous tune”
It was the best night
Never would forget how we moved
The whole place
Was dressed to the nines
And we were dancing, dancing
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight

[Breakdown]
Like we’re made of starlight, starlight
Like we dream impossible dreams
Like starlight, starlight
Like we dream impossible dreams

[Outro]
Don’t you see the starlight, starlight?
Don’t you dream impossible things?