Atilla Taş

Atilla Taş — Biography

Atilla Taş is a singer, actor and columnist who became famous in 1998 with the song "Ham Çökelek" and later also became known for humorous social media posts and television shows. Beyond music he has worked as a presenter and writer, and he still makes headlines with sharp comments on current controversies.

His mother went to Germany when he was very young and his grandmother raised him; he attended high school in Istanbul before the family moved to Mersin. After military service he returned to Istanbul to pursue singing, spending about two years working and living around the Unkapanı record dealers' market. Meeting the producer Erol Köse was the turning point: his first album, Kırmızılım (1998), earned him the best breakthrough male artist award at the Kral TV Video Music Awards. The next year he played Zülküf in the series Zilyoner, and in 2000 he studied film and television at the New York Film Academy; the albums Emmilenyum, Pembeli and Kınalı Kuzum followed. In 1999 he made front pages by claiming to know how David Copperfield performed one of his illusions.

In the 2010s he presented Taş Devri and Ben Burdan Atlarım, drew attention in 2012 with his "Yamyam Style" parody, and published the books Bir Delinin Kapak Defteri and Sakıncalı Çökelek. In 2016 he was arrested on a charge of aiding a terrorist organisation and received a prison sentence; in 2021 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that his right to liberty and security and his freedom of expression had been violated.