Kurt Nilsen was born in Norway on the 29th of September, 1978. This small town plumber living in Bergen Norway startled audiences with his amazing voice, and later went on to become the winner of Norwegian's first televised Pop Idol competition, aired on TV2 on the 23rd of May 2003. His first single 'She's So High' went straight to number 1 in the Norwegian singles chart, and was the country's biggest selling single to date. Shortly after in September 2003 Kurt released his first album, named 'I' which contains a mix of songs written and co-written by Kurt as well as some covers.

In 1997, previous to his success in the Norwegian Idol competition, Kurt came together with three other talented musicians from Bergen (Knut, Anders and Christer) to form the band now known as Fenrik Lane. In 1998 their first single 'Shoe' was released under the name of Breed. They paid for its release out of their own pockets, and only 300 of these were made. It is now a much sought after CD by fans of this band.

1997 was also the year of the birth of Kurt's first child Marte, with his fiance Kristine Jacobsen. In 2000 their second child Erik was born.

On the 5th of April 2002 Fenrik Lane released their first full EP, containing 7 wonderfully quirky tracks, which received great reviews in the National Press. 'Come Down Here' has now sold 17,000 copies, partly as a result of Kurt's Worldwide success. Following the release of 'Come Down Here' Anders left, and John became Fenrik Lane's newest member.
Although Kurt has not been directly involved in Fenrik Lane's most recent album 'Lane Of Life' they continue to do well as a band, and be supported by Kurt as a friend.

On the 1st of January, 2004 Kurt became officially known as a World Idol, when he won the World Idol competition hosted in the UK. This was a coming together of all the winners of Idol shows around the World in a contest broadcast on TV to find the ultimate winner. Competition included popular acts such as Will Young (UK), Kelly Clarkson (USA) and Guy Sebastian (Australia). Kurt came along to the competition as the underdog, from a small Country, and without the traditional Idol image. Many comments were made by the judges about his looks, but he once again amazed the Worldwide audiences with his fantastic rendition of U2's Beautiful Day.
Kurt ran away with the prize of World Idol when 10 out of 11 countries voted for him as their favourite performance of the night.

After winning World Idol Kurt flew back to his home town of Bergen in Norway and was greeted by thousands of hysterical fans, a marching band, the Mayor and other dignatories. And later the same day, Kurt was congratulated over the phone by Norway's Prime Minister.

As a result of his win, Kurt's career was on a high, and an International version of his album 'I' was released in March 2004. The alternative edition of 'I' includes a new bonus track of Beautiful Day, the winning song. Kurt set about on promotional trips and performances all over the world, including brief visits to the UK.

In November 2004 after a lot of hard work from Kurt, his second much anticipated album was released. Unlike his debut 'I' the new album 'A Part Of Me' was completely written by Kurt whilst touring and away from home a lot, and as a result is a much more personal album. With fewer songs contained on the CD, Kurt had chosen to go for quality rather than quantity, and once again fans were blown away by the new songs.

The year 2005 brought with it, both positive and negative times for Kurt. He broke up with his fiance, Kristine Jacobsen in January, after a long term relationship of 11 years.

For the fans this was a good year, with the new album still bursting out from CD players around the World, Kurt set off on a Norwegian tour.

When the tour finally ended, Kurt announced that he would be taking a year out from his music and touring, for a well earned break enjoying the hobbies he has always loved including fishing, and in order to spend some time with his new girlfriend Kristin Halvorsen.

2006 didn’t turn out to be the break from working that Kurt had planned. First he and Kristin celebrated the birth of their first child in January, a son named Lukas. They then got married in July.

In regards to Kurt's career he and three other Norwegian artists Askil Holm, Espen Lind and Alejandro Fuentes, all in the same management, joined forces and went on tour in March as The Guitar Buddies.

Initially, they planned just a short tour (5-6 concerts), but they got so popular that they ended up playing for more than 100,000 people during their around 30 concerts. They released a live album, which they never planned to do, and that album ended up as the fastest selling album of all time in Norway. So far they have sold around 250,000 copies of it. To make the success complete, they also released a live DVD, which also soon became a success. After only two weeks, it was almost the best selling music DVD of all time in Norway.

Sadly, for fans, they had their farewell concerts in October, and now they have gone back to their solo careers.

Good news for fans arrived in the form of a brand new album 'Push Push' released on the 29th October 2007. This is a pop based album which contains a mix of rockier songs and ballads.

In April 2008 Kurt released his much anticipated (and very popular) Country Album called 'Rise To The Occasion'. A great mix of upbeat country sounds and mellow ballads. This album also includes the duet Kurt recorded with the legendary Country singer Willie Nelson 'Lost Highway'. The album also contains a live version of this song as a bonus track. Along with the release of these two albums, Kurt did a hugely successful tour round Norway, finishing off at Rockefeller, Oslo on May 15th.

After all this activity, it seems now Kurt has earned a well deserved rest and some good fishing!) Well the long earned rest did not last long. In the middle of January 2009 it was announced in the Norwegian media that Kurt, Espen, Alejandro and Askil were getting back together again to complete another tour over the summer.

May 9th 2009 saw the 1st "real" show at a sold out Oslo Spektrum. They had performed 2 shows the weekend before in JFK's home town of Slemmestad. The Spektrum concert was recorded and a follow up live cd to "Hallelujah Live" was scheduled for release on 15th June. The cd is entitled "Hallelujah Live vol 2". The first single from this, the U2 classic "With or Without You", entered the Norwegian single chart at one the week of its release. The guys announced a 28 summer concert date tour, spanning the length and breadth of Norway. To publicize the release of the album, they pre-signed 4,000 copies and sent these to one of their sponsors, Statoil and performed a release concert on 13th June, 2009 from the roof of the Statoil gas/petrol station in the town of Lillehammer.
http://www.siste.no/underholdning/article4397494.ece

Although the media have not been very polite about either the guys return as a group or the album, they have played to sell out audiences and sold in access of 75,000 copies of the album to date (end Dec 2009), reaching the number 1 spot in the charts after only two days of its release and staying there for 5 weeks, keeping both a-ha and Michael Jackson from the top spot. Fans are hoping for a DVD release, like last time, but time will tell whether this will happen or not. Kurt has also been incredibly busy helping other artists too. He has helped to produce songs and albums for at least 3 different Norwegian bands, including Fenrik Lane. Their latest radio single, "Diamonds in the Waste" from their forthcoming album, is a song written and produced by Kurt and his good friend Erik Grønner. www.myspace.com/fenriklane Another album to hit the shops this summer with a "Kurt influence" (he plays the drums and sings back up on "On and On") is a media well-received album by an American/Norsk artist: Robert Smith-Hald "Innocent Said":
http://www.dagbladet.no/kultur/2009/07/07/581069.html
http://www.myspace.com/robertsmithhald

Also due for release shortly another album by a local blues band, Orbo and the Longshots has been mainly recorded and produced by Kurt at his "gitarhytte" studio.
http://www.midtsiden.no/content/signerte-med-sony
http://www.myspace.com/orbomusic Will 2010 be the year Kurt finally decides to take a well-earned break from all his musical activities - only time will tell?

… And time did tell; an acoustic solo tour from March to May. Dates announced on home page.

Kurt Facts:

The first time Kurt was on stage was when he was 4 years old, and it was in a Norwegian play      called "Hakkebakkeskogen" where he played "Bakemester harepus"

Kurt has a brother called Jerry.

When Kurt first met Kristine he had purple hair, and the other Fenrik Lane band members could      not believe he had got a girlfriend with that hair!

He plays a lot of instruments including guitar (accoustic, electric, bass), piano, flute, violin, drums      and shaker.

He claims that the instrument that he's best at is shaker (not guitar).

Kurt once said that the song he thought he sang worst on Idol was 'Candle In The Wind'.

His hobbies apart from singing are fishing and football.

Kurt is afraid of heights and dogs.

He is left handed.

Kurt has never learnt to drive.

He was originally going to be a chef, but after cutting himself constantly, he gave the idea up.

It was his father in law who introduced him to plumbing.