Blue Highway
In 2026, the highly-esteemed bluegrass band Blue Highway celebrates 32 years of touring, with four of the original members still intact. Its single “Lonesome State of Mind” was named the MOST-PLAYED SONG IN BLUEGRASS MUSIC of 2023 by Bluegrass Today. Its latest single “Is Now the Time?” was named the #1 song on the Bluegrass Today National Radio Survey on Dec. 5, 2025.
The band has earned a collective 32 IBMA Awards, 6 SPBGMA Awards, one Dove Award, plus three Grammy nominations. Most recently, the band was nominated for IBMA's 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021 and 2020 Vocal Group of the Year as well as Song of the Year Awards.
Blue Highway's #1 album Original Traditional was nominated for a 2017 GRAMMY Award for Best Bluegrass Album.
Blue Highway was voted the Favorite Bluegrass Artist of All Time by the readers of Bluegrass Today in April 2016.
Tim Stafford received honors as 2001 and 2015 SPBGMA Guitar Player of the Year and 2014, 2017 and 2023 IBMA Songwriter of the Year. He co-wrote the 2008 IBMA song of the year--recorded by the band--"Through the Window of a Train." His song (co-written with Steve Gulley) "Both Ends of the Train" earned Blue Highway a nomination for IBMA's 2020 Song of the Year.
Wayne Taylor was inducted into the Virginia Country Music Hall of Fame in October 2016. Shawn Lane was nominated as 2016 IBMA Songwriter of the Year.
Blue Highway charted the Most Radio Airplay of any Bluegrass Artist in 2014, per the 2014 Bluegrass Today Radio Airplay Chart, storming national airplay charts with their heralded album The Game, which topped multiple charts, including reigning at # 1 for 7 consecutive months on the Bluegrass Unlimited Album Chart, and was named the #1 Bluegrass Album of the Year by critic Daniel Mullins in his end of the year Top 20 Albums of 2014 list in Bluegrass Today.
2026 will see the release of the band's 16th album and first live record, Live at ETSU! on Down the Road records with special guests Barry Bales, Jacob Burleson, Grayson Lane, Tom Adams, Alan O'Bryant, Justin Moses, Gaven Largent and Sierra Hull.
As momentum continues to build for the quarter-century strong powerhouse band, Blue Highway is rolling on with a rich legacy and three powerhouse songwriters, instrumentalists and vocalists in Tim Stafford, Wayne Taylor, and Shawn Lane, whose harmonies soar over the dynamic banjo of Jason Burleson and the tasteful Dobro of Gary Hultman.