Helen Reddy

Australian-American entertainer and activist, born on 25 October 1941; died on 29 September 2020. The daughter of an Australian vaudeville troupe, Reddy emigrated from Melbourne, Australia, to New York City, USA, to start her music career as a singer. She rose to prominence in 1971 with her debut song “I Don’t Know How to Love Him” and two albums; both of which made their debut at the Billboard charts. She augmented her fame by releasing her single “I Am Woman” (1972), which became the anthem for second-wave (and beyond) feminists and earned her a Grammy Award in 1973 when she was the first Australian pop musician to be awarded so.

At the peak of her fame between 1973 and 1977, Reddy became the seasonal-regular host of NBC’s “The Midnight Special” in 1975, guest starred in several television shows and continued to dominate the Billboard’s Easy Listening charts with such songs like “Angie Baby”, “You and Me Against The World”, “Delta Dawn”, “Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)”, “Candle on the Water”, “You’re My World” and amongst others. By 1978 to 1983, her popularity and chart appearance waned, with “I Can’t Say Goodbye to You” being her final chart appearance in the 1980s.

She forayed into other actings on the screen, such as Airport 1975 and Pete’s Dragon, the latter in which she, portraying the tritagonist Nora, is most remembered as, in the 1970s. Later in the 1980s to the 1990s, she developed a career in theatres as an actress, where she starred in several plays such as “Anything Goes” and “Blood Brothers”. In 2002, she retired to become a hypnotherapist and moved back to Australia. In 2012, she resumed her music career albeit on an occasion.