Taylor Swift's banjo player is a new dad

Taylor Swift's banjo player faced a race against time to make it to the singer's appearance at the iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas over the weekend (22-23Sep12) after becoming a dad on the eve of their performance.

The Love Story hitmaker and her band were due to take the stage at the star-studded event on Saturday (22Sep12), but she almost had to do without backing musician Mike Meadows after his wife went into labour.

Brittany Meadows gave birth to a little girl named Sophie with her husband by her side on Friday (21Sep12), but he left the hospital soon afterwards and jetted to Sin City just in time for Swift's show.

Showing off a picture of their new addition in a post on Twitter.com, Brittany wrote, "DrumRollPlease... It's my pleasure to introduce you to the one & only Sophie Meadows! @smalltownmike & I are in LOVE!! Since many of you asked...Sophie was born on Friday. @smalltownmike was there when she was born and played iHeart Saturday. He's a ninja!"