Frank Solivan started his musical adventure as a teenager, when he took the 3,000-mile drive from California to Alaska in a 1963 GMC pickup.
Twenty years later, Solivan is heading back to California with his band, Dirty Kitchen. Their 2014 album "Cold Spell" is among the five Grammy nominees for best bluegrass album.
The 57th Grammy Awards will be held Sunday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and broadcast on CBS affiliates at 4 p.m. in Alaska.
"It's a gift," Solivan said of the nomination. "You've been working your butt off and the universe kind of says, 'Nice job.' I feel extremely lucky to be able to play music, but it's also an affirmation. The last six years have been nose to the grindstone to try to get our music in people's ears."
Music was ubiquitous in Solivan's home growing up, and he started playing the fiddle at age 5, also dabbling in guitar and bass. As he developed as an instrumentalist, he started to meet and play with musicians who toured through California's Central Valley.
Among them was singer/guitarist Ginger Boatwright, who became fast friends and pen pals with the young Solivan. When Boatwright moved to Alaska, she recruited an 18-year-old Solivan to come to the state.
Solivan earned a violin scholarship at UAA and worked a battery of jobs while he embedded himself in the local music scene.
"I played in all kinds of country bands up there," Solivan said. "I worked in some warehouses, learned to drive big (commercial) trucks; I even worked for Ginger's husband at Statewide Blasting."
It was also in Alaska in the late 1990s that Solivan started playing mandolin, which is now his primary instrument in Dirty Kitchen.
"Ginger asked me if I could play," Solivan said. "I was joking around and said, 'Of course, it's my best instrument.'"
Despite having little experience on mandolin, he was a quick study, using his picking skills from playing guitar and fretting prowess from the fiddle, which is tuned the same as the mandolin.
Solivan's interest in the instrument has expanded from performing; he trained under a luthier, building the mandolin he played on the nominated album.
Solivan made a few trips to Nashville to record but returned to Alaska, where he met his future wife, Juneau jewelry artist Leah Sturgis.
His next professional move caused Solivan to delve into another instrument. He auditioned to play with Country Current, the U.S. Navy Band based in Washington, D.C.
The gig wasn't playing fiddle or mandolin, but electric country guitar.
"I bought a (Fender) Telecaster and studied every day," he said. "I immersed myself in it and took my knowledge with other instruments."
Despite competing against much more seasoned guitarists, Solivan impressed with the help of his singing and ability to play other instruments and landed the job.
"Next thing you know, I'm doing pushups at basic training," he said.
After a six-year enlistment, Solivan got out of the Navy and put his energy into starting his own band.
Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen put out albums in 2010 and 2013 before the 2014 release of "Cold Spell."
Solivan said the success of the record is based in part on the tight sound of the band and the limited number of overdubs in recording.
"I think there are a few different factors," he said. "We've been playing a lot for the last few years. Musically, we laid it all down and tracked everything basically just like you hear it. I think that spontaneity is why it's great, too."
The news of the nomination was emotional for both Solivan and his wife, who was selling her jewelry at a downtown D.C. holiday arts market in December when reports broke on Twitter.
"I'm just pulling out of D.C. and my phone started exploding with notifications," he said. "I called my wife and she was crying and telling everyone at the market."
Solivan's mother died over the summer of 2014. Solivan got choked up when talking about the call he made to his father.
"I called my dad and he was super excited, but I recently lost my mom, so immediately I thought of her and was really bummed," he said.
Solivan's work with young musicians in Alaska is still a source of pride for Solivan. He said he taught at Cordova's 4H Bluegrass and Old Time Music Camp and at the Alaska Folk Arts Music Camp, where members of the Alaska bluegrass band Bearfoot were some of his first pupils. Now those students are teaching other young campers, Solivan pointed out.
"There are three generations of kids in Alaska that play some of those arrangements, which I find extremely cool," he said. "The music still lives on even though I'm not there."
Despite living mostly Outside for more than a decade, Solivan still identifies as an Alaskan.
"I always tell people, 'I was born in California and I live in Virginia, but I am Alaskan,'" Solivan said.
But a move back to Alaska will likely have to wait, as he said he and his wife's careers are better served in the Lower 48.
"Doing what I do, I can't do it," he said. "Eventually I can see myself in Homer, having a nice boat to fish, a crab pot, a garden, sucking back a beer and being connected to Mother Earth. We dream about it. Someday it may come to fruition. Who knows?"