If you hadn’t heard of Jon Batiste when you went to bed last night, you will have heard of him now. The musician won five Grammys at the Las Vegas Award ceremony, which took place overnight, including Album of the Year for We Are. He was nominated 11 times, the most of any artist this year, and he beat massive household names to get his gongs, including Billie Eilish, Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo.

64th Annual Grammy Awards, in Las Vegas

But when Lenny Kravitz called out his name he looked utterly bewildered. Wrinkling his nose, laughing in disbelief, he shook his head, as if to say, me? His mannerisms may have mirrored most of the UK, who were, and are, thinking – sorry, but who?

Despite his US fame, so far Batiste hasn’t quite made it across the pond. So here is everything you need to know about the man of the musical moment.

Music’s in his blood

Batiste comes from a family of New Orleans jazz and blues legends, which includes singer Lionel Batiste, drummer Russell Batiste Jr. and jazz trumpeter Milton Batiste. Milton was so famous that The Guardian wrote an obituary about him when he died in 2001.

In his early twenties Batiste moved to New York, attending New York’s Juilliard, the performing arts school which also produced Philip Glass and Nina Simone. Now he’s married to journalist and author Suleika Jaouad, who wrote the ‘Life, Interrupted’ column in The New York Times about facing cancer in her twenties.

Early starter

Given his background it’s no real surprise that Batiste released his first album when he was only 17. He then released his second while still at Juilliard, and made his concert debut at the age of 20.

He released Social Music in 2013. Jazz fans may know it – the project went to the top of Billboard and iTunes charts and stayed there for over a month. Then, after several further albums and a single, his cover of St. James Infirmary Blues was nominated for a Grammy in 2019.

Batiste has also toured and acted: In HBO’s Treme, where he played himself, and in Spike Lee’s film Red Hook Summer, for which he also composed and performed the organ music.

Hang on, isn’t he that guy from...?

If Batiste’s face is really familiar, but you just can’t place where you’ve seen him – we may have the answer. Since 2015 Batiste (and his band Stay Human) have been the house band of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Yes – that’s where the penny dropped for us, too.

Following last night’s accolades it seems like an odd gig, but during the show they’ve played alongside Billy Joel, John Legend, Grace VanderWaal, and Nas.

A glittering night at the Grammys

So that brings us to last night’s Grammys. Batiste’s winning album, We Are had only made it to No. 86 on the Billboard album chart, which was probably one of the main reasons for his incredulity on being announced the winner (plus he shared a category with Justin Beiber, Doja Cat and Kanye West, so you can forgive him for not really giving himself the best odds).

Over the last ten years, winners of the Best Album award have always also been the year’s biggest artists – think Bruno Mars, Daft Punk, Adele and Taylor Swift. There have been a few outside the popstar genre – for example Beck, Mumford & Sons and Arcade Fire – but Batiste is still very much an outlier within this crowd. As a result, for music buffs his win comes as one of the standout moments from last’s night’s extravaganza.

Dressed in a an oversized long black shirt with silver beading that resembled a sort of sparkling chainmail, Batiste also took to the stage for wins of Best Music Video, Best American Roots Performance, Best American Roots Song and Best Score Soundtrack for Visual Media, for his work with Nine Inch Nails band members Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross on the Disney and Pixar animated film Soul.