Taylor Swift first U.S. tour dates sell in minutes

Taylor Swift arrives onstage after being invited by Beyonce to finish her previously interrupted acceptance speech for best female video at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards in New York, September 13, 2009.[Agencies]

LOS ANGELES - Tickets to four of country singer Taylor Swift's 2010 tour dates sold out in two minutes after going on sale on Friday, her publicists said.

All tickets released on Friday for 15 U.S. shows in the 19 year-old singer's 2010 Fearless tour sold "within minutes". The four shows in the New York area were the fastest to go, her representatives said.

Swift, the biggest selling U.S. artist of 2008, will play 37 shows in the United States and Canada in 2010 and seven in Australia starting in February.

The teen star, whose hits include "You Belong with Me" and "Love Story", has seen her popularity soar since September, when rapper Kanye West hijacked her acceptance speech for a best music video trophy at the MTV Video Music Awards show and said it should have gone to R&B singer Beyonce instead.

Swift was nominated for a leading six American Music Awards earlier this month and will perform on and host the popular U.S. late night TV sketch show "Saturday Night Live" on November 7.

West, on the other hand, canceled a planned concert tour of the United States and Canada earlier this month and was the subject of an Internet death hoax earlier this week which falsely claimed he had died in a Los Angeles car crash.