Billy Strings is flabbergasted.

That’s the word he uses to describe his state of mind on a Monday afternoon in March less than 24 hours after his record Home received a Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album.

The nomination itself had taken him by surprise when he first learned of it four months earlier. Strings recalls, “I was playing my guitar and I heard my girlfriend [and tour manager, Ally Dale] holler from downstairs. She screamed real loud and I was like, ‘Did you cut yourself or something?’ Then she ran upstairs, gave me a big hug and told me: ‘Y’all got nominated for a Grammy.’ I couldn’t even believe that.”

After winning an award for what is only his second full-length studio effort, the 28-year-old guitarist is caught up in a whirlwind of congratulations. He’s already heard from three of his heroes: Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas and Béla Fleck. The litany of well-wishers also includes the friends he’s made on the road, at home in Nashville and during his childhood in rural Michigan. (“People I’ve known from high school, middle school, even the elementary school playground in third grade hit me up,” he says.)