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Taylor Swift Named IFPI 2023 Global Recording Artist of the Year

US singer-songwriter Taylor Swift performs during the first night of the The Eras Tour in Australia at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia, 16 February 2024. (EPA)
US singer-songwriter Taylor Swift performs during the first night of the The Eras Tour in Australia at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia, 16 February 2024. (EPA)
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Taylor Swift Named IFPI 2023 Global Recording Artist of the Year

US singer-songwriter Taylor Swift performs during the first night of the The Eras Tour in Australia at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia, 16 February 2024. (EPA)
US singer-songwriter Taylor Swift performs during the first night of the The Eras Tour in Australia at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia, 16 February 2024. (EPA)

Pop superstar Taylor Swift added another honor to her long list of accolades on Wednesday, winning the global recording artist of the year award for the fourth time from the IFPI, the organization that represents the recorded music industry.

The "Anti-Hero" singer scooped the award for the second year running, and has previously won it 2014 and 2019. The latest is for 2023.

The prize is calculated by looking at an artist’s or group’s worldwide sales for streaming, download and physical music formats during the calendar year and covers their whole body of work, according to the IFPI.

It is presented to the artist who tops the IFPI Global Artist Chart, which Swift has done more than any other artist since its introduction 11 years ago.

"She continues to redefine the limits of global success. Taylor is a singular talent and her commitment to her craft and her fans is truly phenomenal," Lewis Morrison, director of charts and certifications at IFPI, said in a statement.

K-Pop stars SEVENTEEN and Stray Kids came second and third respectively in the chart in what IFPI described as a "record year for Korean artists".

Four K-Pop acts made the top 10 with TOMORROW X TOGETHER at no.7 and NewJeans at no.8.

Other artists to feature in the top 10 include Drake at no. 4, The Weeknd at no.5.

Earlier this month, Swift, 34, set another record at the Grammy Awards, winning the prize for album of the year for an unprecedented fourth time.

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UK Blues Legend John Mayall Dead at 90 

English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
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UK Blues Legend John Mayall Dead at 90 

English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)

John Mayall, the British blues pioneer whose 1960s music collective the Bluesbreakers helped usher in a fertile period of rock and brought guitarists like Eric Clapton to prominence, has died at 90, his family said Tuesday.

Mayall, a singer and multi-instrumentalist who was dubbed "the godfather of British blues," and whose open-door arrangement saw some of the greats in the genre hone their craft with him and his band, "passed away peacefully in his California home" on Monday, according to a statement posted on his Facebook page.

It did not state a cause of death.

"Health issues that forced John to end his epic touring career have finally led to peace for one of this world's greatest road warriors," it said. "John Mayall gave us 90 years of tireless efforts to educate, inspire and entertain."

Mayall's influence on 1960s rock and beyond is enormous. Members of the Bluesbreakers eventually went on to join or form groups including Cream, Fleetwood Mac, the Rolling Stones and many more.

At age 30, Mayall moved to London from northern England in 1963. Sensing revolution in the air, he gave up his profession as a graphic designer to embrace a career in blues, the musical style born in Black America.

He teamed up with a series of young guitarists including Clapton, Peter Green, later of Fleetwood Mac, and Mick Taylor who helped form the Rolling Stones.

In the Bluesbreakers' debut album in 1966, "Blues Breakers With Eric Clapton," John Mayall enthralled music aficionados with a melding of soulful rock and gutsy, guitar-driven American blues featuring covers of tunes by Robert Johnson, Otis Rush and Ray Charles.

The blues music he was playing in British venues was "a novelty for white England," he told AFP in 1997.

That album was a hit, catapulting Clapton to stardom and bringing a wave of popularity to a more raw and personal blues music.

Mayall moved to California in 1968 and toured America extensively in 1972.

He recorded a number of landmark albums in the 1960s including "Crusade," "A Hard Road," and "Blues From Laurel Canyon." Dozens more followed in the 1970s and up to his latest, "The Sun Is Shining Down," in 2022.

Mayall was awarded an OBE, an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, in 2005.