All About Amy Winehouse's Brother Alex Winehouse

Amy Winehouse bared her innermost life in her soulful, bluesy music — but few people knew her like her brother, Alex Winehouse.

“She was annoying, frustrating, a pain in the bum,” he told The Guardian in 2013. “But she was also incredibly generous, very caring. She'd do anything for anyone, she really would. She was loyal — as a sister, daughter and friend."

He continued, "She was probably the most loyal friend to people I've ever known ... She was a really good person."

At only 23 years old, the singer had a meteoric rise to fame with the release of her 2006 album Back to Black. The record won five Grammy Awards and has gone on to sell more than 16 million copies worldwide, per The Hollywood Reporter.

Amid her success, though, Amy struggled with addiction to drugs and alcohol, and her troubled marriage to Blake Fielder-Civil. On July 23, 2011, Amy died at age 27 of "alcohol toxicity" in London.

Over 10 years after her death, her music lives on — in October 2023, the video for her single “Back to Black” hit 1 billion views on YouTube.

Alex has played a significant role in keeping Amy's memory and legacy alive. His family collaborated with filmmakers on the May 2024 biopic Back to Black, directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson and starring Marisa Abela.

He’s also the creative director of the Amy Winehouse Foundation, which educates kids about the risks of substance abuse and supports women in recovery. Additionally, Alex and his wife Riva helped to curate the “Amy Winehouse: A Family Portrait” exhibit at the Jewish Museum in London.

Here's everything to know about Amy Winehouse’s brother, Alex Winehouse.

He grew up in London with Amy

Mitch and Janis Winehouse welcomed Alex in 1980, and Amy followed four years later, on Sept. 14, 1983. Their parents divorced when they were kids.

“In all aspects she was just a normal Jewish kid from North London, who did normal kid things, went to drama class, loved her grandma, her mum and dad, loved her brother," Mitch told PEOPLE in 2023.

That same year, the family released a book, Amy Winehouse: In Her Own Words, offering a glimpse into her and Alex’s childhood, including photos of them as kids and lists she made about her future goals.

"Amy devoured films, musicals, novels and poetry, or took inspiration from our family life in North London or the twists and turns of her many friendships," Mitch and Janis wrote in the book’s foreword.

Royalties from the book went to the Amy Winehouse Foundation.

Amy's death impacted Alex and their parents

The world mourned Amy when she died at the age of 27 on July 23, 2011, but no one was hit harder than her closest family members.

The day after her death, Mitch, Janis and Alex released a joint statement to the press, per The Guardian.

“Our family has been left bereft by the loss of Amy, a wonderful daughter, sister, niece. She leaves a gaping hole in our lives,” it read. “We are coming together to remember her and we would appreciate some privacy and space at this terrible time.”

Alex is married and has a son

In November 2011, Alex married Riva Lefton, according to the Daily Mail.

The couple have at least one child, a son named Cosmo, born on Sept. 11, 2014.

“He is gorgeous,” Mitch told The Telegraph a few days after his grandson's birth.

The family collaborated on the 2024 biopic Back to Black

In 2016, the film Amy won the Oscar for Best Documentary — but the singer's family was vocally against the project from its inception and blocked a 2011 attempt at making a biopic.

Ten years after Amy's death, her family collaborated with the BBC on Amy Winehouse: 10 Years On. In that documentary, her closest family members revealed the personal side of the singer.

"I don't feel the world knew the true Amy, the one I brought up," Janis said in a press release, according to BBC. "I'm looking forward to the opportunity to offer an understanding of her roots and a deeper insight into the real Amy."

Most recently, the 2024 film Back to Black was also made with the family's guidance. "That's how we'll get our own back, by portraying Amy the way she was," Mitch said on The Morning After podcast in 2020.

Alex works for the Amy Winehouse Foundation

On Sept. 14, 2011, which would have been Amy's 28th birthday, the family launched the Amy Winehouse Foundation. The organization educates kids on the dangers of drug use and also provides music therapy. In 2016, it launched Amy’s Place, a halfway home for women who have recently left rehab programs.

“Today, the Amy Winehouse Foundation helps thousands of young people to feel supported and informed, so that they are better able to manage their emotional wellbeing and make informed choices around things that can affect their lives,” the foundation’s website reads.

Speaking to The Guardian ahead of Amy's retrospective exhibition, Alex shared the family's reasoning behind creating the foundation. "Dad had two choices – he could either let it destroy him, or use Amy's memory to invigorate himself to do something good,” he said.

For his part, Alex left his career as a music journalist to become the organization's creative director.

He also explained why he shares his memories of Amy sparingly: "If I'm going to speak, it's because ... we, the foundation, are doing something really, really cool. I'm not going to talk for the sake of talking."

Alex and his wife curated an exhibition about Amy

Originally an exhibit that opened at London’s Jewish Museum in 2013, “Amy Winehouse: A Family Portrait” was a collection of Amy's personal items and family artifacts. Alex and his wife, Riva, helped to curate the collection, which included photos of the siblings growing up in North London.

"Amy was someone who was incredibly proud of her Jewish-London roots," Alex told the BBC. "Whereas other families would go to the seaside on a sunny day, we'd always go down to the East End ... I hope, in this most fitting of places, that the world gets to see this other side not just to Amy, but to our typical Jewish family."

The exhibit traveled to San Francisco, Vienna and Amsterdam, among other destinations, and reopened in London in 2017, according to The Australian Jewish News.

Throughout the exhibit, Alex wrote explanations of some items. “It’s a snapshot of a girl who was, to her deepest core, simply a little Jewish kid from North London with a big talent who, more than anything, just wanted to be true to her heritage,” one caption read.

A different item was Claudia Roden’s The Book of Jewish Food, which Alex gifted to Amy for her birthday in 2002.

“I bought it for her because she wanted to know how to make chicken soup,” he wrote. “It wasn’t a particularly great creation. Her meatballs were always excellent though.”

Alex has said he still feels Amy's presence

In 2021, Mitch talked to the Jewish News about how Amy continues to be present in their lives.

“I feel her all the time and I know Janis does too,” he added. “My son Alex says he has seen her in a pale blue light. We all feel her presence.”