Atz Kilcher Biography

Fast Facts

• Born after his parents escaped Hitler's grip on Eastern Europe and moved to the Alaskan wilderness
• Grew up in a musical family and was home-schooled until a road was built that allowed him to travel to the closest public school
• Quote: "I make stuff out of stuff․ I take pieces of nature and rearrange them, give them new life․ It's my way of sharing the land I love with others․ It's also a way for me to honor the earth, to be intimate and stay in touch with her․"
• His discography includes "Voices of the Valley" and "Spirit Filled Air․"
• In the 1950s and 1960s, he performed with his family in Alaska and Europe
• Best known as the father of famous singer-songwriter, Jewel, and for the Discovery reality series "Alaska: The Last Frontier," which follows his family's out-of-the-ordinary lifestyle in the Alaskan wilderness
• Started making his own artistic baskets out of the roots of spruce, birch, cotton wood, alder, willow, elderberry, rose bush and devils club and selling them