Collaboration with Taylor Swift and 8 Grammys: how a descendant of immigrants from Belarus conquered American show business

Jack Antonoff is known for his music career and production. And while the whole world is watching to see if he will receive his next Grammy award, we will tell you how a descendant of immigrants from Belarus conquered the United States and collaborated with Taylor Swift and Lana Del Rey.

Photo: IStock

He is not a direct descendant, his family moved to the USA long before Jack was born, but he still has some Belarusian blood in him.

Jack's maternal grandfather was Max Wall (son of Leibel Wall and Gertrude Hindich). Max, who was a rabbi, was born in Poland. And his father Leibel was born in Pinsk (Belarus).

According to Wikipedia, Jack Antonoff was born on March 31, 1984 in New Jersey. He is currently the lead singer of the rock band Bleachers and the guitarist and drummer of the pop rock band Fun. Jack was previously the lead singer of the indie rock band Steel Train.

In addition to his main job, Jack Antonoff writes songs and produces various artists, in particular Taylor Swift, The 1975, Lorde, St. Vincent, Florence and the Machine, Lana Del Rey, Fifth Harmony, Kevin Abstract, Carly Rae Jepsen, The Chicks, Tegan and Sara, and Clairo. Antonoff is often credited with significantly influencing the sound of contemporary popular music since the mid-2010s.

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Antonoff was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and received eight Grammy Awards, including Producer of the Year in 2022 and 2023. In the same he received a nomination and was included in the Grammy list for 2024.

He also received Grammys for his work with Fun, for producing Taylor Swift's 1989 and Folklore albums, and for producing St. Vincent's Daddy's Home and co-writing the title track for St. Vincent's Masseduction.

Collaboration with Taylor Swift

Jack is simply an irreplaceable personality in the world of show business. He collaborated with many stars, but one of his most intense partnerships was with Taylor Swift.

In 2013, Jack Antonoff wrote and produced the song Sweeter than Fiction with American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift for the film One Chance.

The song was written in Jack's New York City apartment after he and Swift fell in love with a certain snare drum sound from a Fine Young Cannibals song. Before starting the songwriting process, they brainstormed their ideas via email.

Taylor Swift and Jack Antonoff co-wrote and produced three songs on Swift's fifth studio album (1989), including the singles Out of the Woods, I Wish You Would and the bonus track You Are in Love. The album "1989" was released in October 2014 and became the best-selling album in the United States that year. In the deluxe version of the album, Taylor Swift explains that the song "I Wish You Would" comes from a guitar track that Jack Antonoff recorded on his smartphone. When Swift first heard it, she asked Jack if she could take the idea further, and it ended up becoming an album track. The album earned Jack Antonoff a Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 2016.

In 2016, Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff and Sam Dew wrote Taylor Swift and Zayn's song I Don't Wanna Live Forever, produced by Antonoff, for the film Fifty Shades Darker.

The duo also wrote and produced the number one single Look What You Made Me Do, which was released on August 25, 2017. Antonoff became a key member of Swift's sixth studio album, Reputation. In addition to Look What You Made Me Do, Swift and Antonoff wrote and produced five other songs on Reputation - Gaway Car, Dress, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Call It What You Want and New Year's Day.

In 2019, Taylor Swift and Jack Antonoff co-wrote eight songs and produced eleven tracks for Swift's seventh studio album Lover, including promotional single "The Archer" and the title track, which served as the album's third single.

In 2020, Swift and Antonoff worked together on Swift's eighth studio album, Folklore. Along with Aaron Dessner and Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff serves as one of the album's songwriters and producers, with Antonoff helping produce six songs and writing four, including the third single Betty. Jack Antonoff continued to collaborate with Taylor Swift on Folklore, as well as on Swift's ninth studio album, Evermore, on which he co-wrote the tracks Gold Rush and Ivy.

Jack Antonoff co-produced Swift's 2022 album Midnights and wrote eleven of the thirteen tracks. He starred in the video for the ninth track of Bejeweled.

Personal life

In 2023, Antonoff married Sarah Margaret Qualley. She is an American actress, dancer and model, best known for her roles as Jill Harvey in The Leftovers, Kitty Kat in Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and Alex in The Cleaning Lady. The story of a single mother."

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Jack Antonoff has spoken publicly about his struggles with depression, anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He said hearing about others' struggles with depression made him feel "not better, but not alone and less afraid."

He has germophobia, exacerbated by a bout of pneumonia he suffered in 2011 while recording a studio album for his band Fun.

His pulmonologist prescribed a daily run, but he explained that he hated it “more than anything” because it was “one of the most boring things on Earth.”

“I need a hobby, and I don’t want it to be, for example, basketball. I want it to be music. So to take my mind off music, I make other music. If I'm producing someone else's song or writing with someone else, then performing Bleachers or Fun is an escape that allows me to stay creative and focus on what I want to do. If something is driving me crazy, I need to go somewhere, and I don’t want it to be yoga,” he admitted.

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