Katelyn Tarver

Los Angeles-based singer, songwriter, and actress Katelyn Tarver was maintaining successful careers in each of those roles by her mid-twenties. A teen-pop singer turned TV actress (Big Time Rush, No Ordinary Family) by the early 2010s, she focused on writing songs for others mid-decade and had a U.K. hit as a songwriter with Cheryl Cole’s “Crazy Stupid Love” in 2014. Tarver released her own, adult-pop debut single, “Weekend Millionaires,” in 2016, going viral with the atmospheric ballad “You Don’t Know” the following year. Continuing to win acting parts on television, she was also a winner on the 2019 inaugural season of Songland, a songwriting competition. In 2021, the album Subject to Change saw her settling into a more sophisticated adult alternative pop sound.
Raised in rural Glennville, Georgia, Tarver began singing in local and then national talent competitions as a child. After making the finals of TV’s American Juniors as a 13-year-old in 2003, she took part in a national tour and met with industry professionals in Los Angeles. Her teen-pop full-length debut, Wonderful Crazy, followed in 2005.
Tarver made her acting debut with a recurring role on the Nickelodeon musical-comedy series Big Time Rush (2009-2013). In the meantime, she appeared on ABC’s No Ordinary Family in 2010 and 2011, and released the EP A Little More Free in 2011. It was produced by Goodbye Tomorrow’s Matt Grabe. Another recurring acting role, this time on the ABC Family show The Secret Life of the American Teenager, followed in 2012, as did tour dates in support of her EP.
“Crazy Stupid Love,” a song Tarver co-wrote with Cheryl Cole and others for Cole’s 2014 album Only Human, was released as a single that year and went to number one in the U.K. That led to an opportunity to collaborate with producer/songwriter/composer Ludwig Göransson on her first official solo single, “Weekend Millionaires,” which she shared online in 2015. It received a commercial release a year later. Remixes from artists including Young Bombs and Skizzy Mars helped boost the song’s popularity, and she included it on the 2017 EP Tired Eyes, issued on Duly Noted Records. Another track on the EP, “You Don’t Know,” became her most wide-reaching song to that point, garnering tens of the millions of streams between platforms, including a popular live version. Still pursuing acting, Tarver starred on the short-lived Twentyfiveish and appeared on five episodes of the Freeform network drama Famous in Love in 2017. Another EP, the self-released Kool Aid, followed in 2018. That year, she also had a recurring part on the HBO comedy series Ballers, starring Dwayne Johnson.
In mid-2019, Tarver became a reality TV contestant again, competing on the NBC songwriting contest Songland. Her episode-winning song “Young” was recorded by country-pop outfit Old Dominion and featured in an automobile commercial. That September, she returned with her own song, “Cynical,” which kicked off a succession of non-album singles over the next year that coincided with a run on the web series Twentyfiveish (2000). Tarver began sharing material from her first solo LP in 16 years, Subject to Change, in 2021, self-releasing the album that November. ~ Marcy Donelson