Grammy nominee Gracie Abrams' music has Swift calling

She released her debut album, opened for Taylor Swift, sold out a United States tour and took that show to Europe.

She started writing new music and to cap it all off, she got her first Grammy nomination - for best new artist.

When the nominations dropped in early November, Abrams, 24, was at home, alone.

"I just couldn't have anticipated it less, you know," she said.

"And so it was kind of this really, extremely exciting honour and a really sweet cherry on top to a year of so many gifts."

Abrams immediately called her mum.

But the first person to call her was fellow best new artist and first-time nominee, Noah Kahan. (They were "screaming on the phone", she says.)

The two are joined in the category by Ice Spice, Victoria Monet, Fred Again.., Jelly Roll, Coco Jones and The War and Treaty.

Looking ahead to the February 4 Grammy ceremony in Los Angeles, Abrams said: "I'm really stoked to just cheer really loudly for everyone."

Her debut album, Good Riddance, will turn one about then.

"The whole thesis of the record for me was kind of just walking away from versions of myself that I didn't recognise anymore," Abrams said.

That comes through on songs such as Right Now (with lyrics including "left my past life on the ground/think I'm more alive, somehow") and the deluxe track Unsteady ("I'm in danger/the girl in the mirror's a stranger").

Both reference personal situations and ubiquitous emotions in a way that is typical of Abrams' work - a combination that makes fans often so clearly feel the lyrics at her shows, tears are not uncommon.

"The luckiest thing I've gotten to experience from all this, I think, is being able to connect with people that way," she said.

"There's something really rare about places where you can just show up and be so outwardly emotional with strangers."

Abrams made the album with The National's Aaron Dessner, at Long Pond, his studio in upstate New York.

The wooded setting (as seen in Swift's "folklore" film ) was isolated, but different than the bedroom solitude much of her music had been composed in previously.

"I remember getting there,'" she said of their collaboration.

"I had never actually met him but I stayed for a week and it was immediately kind of like, 'oh, let me tell you everything as if like you are a licensed psychiatrist'.

"The thing that's so magical about Long Pond is like nine times out of 10, it feels like we're just pulling things out of thin air and they end up in a way that we're satisfied with."

Those songs quickly made their way to one of the year's biggest stages, as Abrams joined the stacked roster of young performers opening for Swift's Eras Tour.

Perhaps the pinnacle of that experience for Abrams came in Cincinnati when Swift invited her onstage for a duet after weather cancelled Abrams' set.

They traded verses of Abrams' "I miss you, I'm sorry", with Swift on the guitar and Abrams on the piano.

"It really was nuts," Abrams said.

"There's nothing weirder than getting raised up in the middle of a stage on a platform.

"It felt like the Hunger Games or something."

So far, Abrams' is the only song Swift has performed on the Eras Tour stage other than her own.

Abrams will return to Swift's stage in 2024 on 18 added dates in the US and Canada.

Those shows have become a benchmark for her as she looks ahead to 2024, to new music and this new - more free - version of herself onstage.

"That environment, her stage and that tour has had a massive influence on the way that I've wanted to work to maybe one day be able to fill the space better than I did last time," Abrams said.

"That is a superpower - and I want to do that."

By then, she'll hopefully have new music to share.

"I've never been more excited for music to come out like by miles and miles," she said, laughing.

"I just can't quite wait."

Australian Associated Press