Ted Albert Award - Helen Reddy

The Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music, 2020

The Australian Music Vault is proud to posthumously honour the achievements of this year’s recipient of the Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music, the late Helen Reddy. The Ted Albert Award is one of the nation’s most prestigious music awards. It is awarded annually by the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) in honour of pioneering independent record producer Ted Albert, whose company, Albert Productions, was home to music icons The Easybeats, AC/DC, The Angels, Rose Tattoo and John Paul Young. Previous winners of the award include The Seekers, Ian “Molly” Meldrum, Fifa Riccobono, Archie Roach, Midnight Oil and Rob Potts.

Singer, actress and activist Helen Reddy is best known for her song ‘I Am Woman’ which became an international anthem for second wave feminism during the 1970s. Throughout her extraordinary career, Reddy released 17 albums (seven of which were certified gold) and 31 singles including Top 10 hits ‘I Am Woman’, ‘Delta Dawn’ and ‘Angie Baby’. This extensive discography earned her the nickname ‘Queen of 1970s pop’.

Born in Melbourne in 1941, Helen Reddy grew up surrounded by an extended theatrical family with roots stretching back to the turn of the century. Her mother Stella Lamond was a talented actress and singer; her father Max Reddy was an actor, writer, producer and comedian; and her sister Toni Lamond and nephew Tony Sheldon are two of Australian showbiz’s most revered performers.

It was during this time of ‘the show must go on’ that Reddy made her stage debut joining her parents at the Tivoli Theatre in Perth at the age of four. By the time she was a teenager, Reddy was a veteran performer, and in a brief moment of rebellion, she left the family business to marry and have her first child. During the 1960s she returned to singing making several appearances on television, including on Swallow's Juniors and Helen Reddy Sings before winning a talent contest on Bandstand in 1966. The prize announced was a passage to New York City with an opportunity to record a single for Mercury Records. Unfortunately, the offer turned out to be for an audition only, and when Reddy arrived in New York City she was informed that the company considered her Bandstand performance her audition and that they were passing. Reddy was reportedly told there was no market for another female singer at that time.

Despite this major setback, Reddy remained in North America with her young daughter, Traci, and continued to pursue a career in the music industry performing wherever she could find work, including in clubs as far away as Canada. Two years later, down to her last few dollars, she met her second husband Jeff Wald who was working for William Morris Agency. In 1969, the pair moved to Los Angeles via Chicago where Reddy built up a solid following as a lounge singer.

Soon after arriving in Los Angeles, Wald started managing acts like Deep Purple and Tiny Tim, as well as actor Sylvester Stallone. Reddy was concerned that he was doing so much to promote other people and demanded that he dedicate himself to her career. In 1970, Wald approached Artie Mogull, executive at Capitol Records and asked him to record Helen. After five months of persistent phone calls, Reddy record a single, ‘I Believe in Music.’ The B-side of the record was ‘I Don’t Know How To Love Him’ from Jesus Christ Superstar which charted well in Canada and Australia. In 1971, following the moderate success of this single, she recorded her first album with Capitol Records, I Don’t Know How To Love Him. On that album were two songs written by Reddy and her Australian writing partner, Ray Burton: ‘Best Friend’ and ‘I Am Woman’.

Helen Reddy was inspired to write the song after feeling frustrated by the lack of music that related to her own experiences of womanhood. Encouraged by her friend, Australian ex-pat journalist Lillian Roxon, Reddy wrote her own lyrics and sent them to Burton who composed the music. The song featured over the credits of the feminist feature film Stand Up and Be Counted (1972). Capitol Records decided to re-release the song on a ’45 but with an additional verse. The popularity of the song built slowly through regular requests on radio stations and in June 1972 it entered the Billboard Hot 100 Charts. By December, 'I Am Woman' had reached No 1.

‘I Am Woman’ has since become an anthem for the Women's Liberation Movement and made a significant impact around the globe. Helen Reddy received a Grammy Award for the song winning in the category of Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. In her acceptance speech, Reddy famously thanked “God, because She makes everything possible.”

The night I won the Grammy. The betting was very hot for Roberta Flack. I told myself it didn't matter. In terms of cold cash it in fact mattered about $1 million. In terms of publicity it was incalculable. And the competition was pretty good. It was nice beating Streisand.

In the following years, Reddy had a number of singles top the Adult Contemporary charts including ‘Delta Dawn’, ‘Angie Baby’ and ‘Emotion’ (a translation of the French song ‘Amoureuse’). It is estimated that she has sold over 80 million records worldwide. During this period she had a headline residency in Las Vegas to sell-out crowds every night. In 1973, she hosted an American variety summer special called The Helen Reddy Show with guests including The Pointer Sisters, Cheech and Chong, Gladys Knight, Peter Allen and Chuck Berry. She also appeared regularly on The Carol Burnett Show during this time. In 1974, she was granted the honour of a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, then in 1976, The First Lady of the United States Betty Ford spotted Reddy and Burnett performing a medley of songs on The Carol Burnett Show and requested that they perform the routine at a State Dinner at The White House.

Throughout the 1980s and 90s, Reddy returned to the stage performing in musicals including Anything Goes, Call Me Madam and The Mystery of Edwin Drood. In 1995, she made her Broadway debut in Willy Russel’s Blood Brothers. In 2017, she performed an a cappella version of ‘I Am Woman’ in front of an audience of 750,000 people marching for women’s rights following the inauguration of Donald Trump.

In 2020, a biopic drama based on her life and career I Am Woman, starring Tilda Cobham-Hervey and directed by Unjoo Moon, was released.

On 29 September 2020, Helen Reddy passed away in Los Angeles at the age of 78. 

¹ https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/from-the-archives-helen-reddy-and-the-glow-of-success-20190301-p5115m.html