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James Vernon Taylor (born March 12, 1948, in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Taylor was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. Taylor achieved his breakthrough in 1970 with the No. 3 single "Fire and Rain" and had his first No. 1 hit the following year with "You've Got a Friend", a recording of Carole King's classic song. His 1976 Greatest Hits album was certified Diamond and has sold 12 million US copies. Following his 1977 album, JT, he has retained a large audience over the decades. His commercial achievements declined slightly until a resurgence during the late 1990s and 2000s, when he recorded some of his best-selling and most-awarded work (including Hourglass, October Road and Covers).

At the age of 3, he moved with his family to North Carolina, where he lived for the rest of his childhood (though his well-off family usually spent summers on Martha's Vineyard, off the coast of Massachusetts). Taylor's mother had studied singing; Taylor, like all of her children, was also musically inclined. Initially a cellist, he began to play the guitar when he was around 12 years old.

In 1965, James Taylor committed himself to McLean Psychiatric Hospital in Massachusetts. During his stay there, he honed his songwriting skills. After leaving McLean in 1966, he helped form a band, The Flying Machine. When the group broke up, Taylor moved to London, where he was signed by the Beatles' Apple record label. Taylor's debut album, James Taylor, was well-liked by critics, but didn't sell well.

In 1969, Taylor returned to the United States. Struggling with a heroin addiction, he checked into a hospital in New York, and then went to Austin Riggs, a Massachusetts psychiatric facility. After those stays, he played the 1969 Newport Folk Festival. Then he moved to California and recorded a new album, this time for Warner Brothers.

Taylor's career skyrocketed with the success of his second album, Sweet Baby James (1970), which contains what may be Taylor's best-known song, the gentle "Fire and Rain." Both the album and the song reached No. 3 in their respective chart categories. On his next album, Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon, Taylor had a No. 1 hit with his cover of "You've Got a Friend," written by Carole King. He also won a Grammy for his performance of that song.

Following a few moderately successful releases, James Taylor's Greatest Hits came out in 1976. The album was a success from the start, and has now received diamond certification (meaning it has sold more than 10 million copies). In 1977, Taylor won a second Grammy for his cover of "Handy Man." It was from the first album he recorded for Columbia, the multiplatinum-selling JT.

Over the next few decades, Taylor's musical output included studio albums, live recordings and even work on a Broadway musical. Hourglass (1997) won the Grammy for Best Pop Album (Taylor won Grammys in 2001 and 2003 as well). Touring has also enhanced Taylor's popularity, as well as his album sales; almost all of his releases have now attained either gold or platinum status.

Taylor has been sober since 1984. After two failed marriages—to Carly Simon from 1972 to 1983, and to Kathryn Walker from 1985 to 1996—he wed Carolyn Smedvig in 2001.

Throughout his career, Taylor—who is proudly liberal—has offered his support to causes and people he believes in. He has given concerts for politicians such as George McGovern, Barack Obama and Elizabeth Warren, and was a staunch opponent of Jesse Helms. Taylor has also appeared at numerous benefit concerts, including one to raise funds for victims of the Boston Marathon bombings.

In 2000, Taylor was inducted into both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He received a National Medal of the Arts in 2011 and was designated a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government in 2012. Perhaps most important, Taylor continues to be esteemed as a songwriter and performer whose work speaks to people's inner emotional lives.