HOLD ME IN YOUR DREAMS TONIGHT
HELEN REDDY
SONGWRITER: CAIN
COUNTRY: australiana
TRANSCRIBED BY: SOLEDAD MACINNON
TRANSCRIBED BY: SOLEDAD MACINNON
ALBUM: music music
LABEL: capitol records
GENRE: pop
YEAR: 1976
The #1 Grammy-winning "I Am Woman" became not
only THE anthem of the feminist movement during the radical 1970s, but also the
signature song for its crop-haired composer and singer Helen Reddy. Three
decades later this is the hit people still remember her for, despite the fact
she had an abundance of other "top ten" records over the course of
her long career.
Helen
Maxine Lamond Reddy was born in Melbourne, Australia, to showbiz parents,
comedy actor/producer/writer Max Reddy and singer/soap opera actress Stella
Lamond. She has
English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh ancestry. Helen began performing at the age
of four at the Tivoli Theatre in Perth, Australia, touring much of her native
country with her parents. She left boarding school at age 15 to work on the
road singing and acting. Her musical style is best described as a light amalgam
of rhythm and blues, easy rock and jazz. Her soothing, quivery vocals and
equally warm appeal was instantly embraced, eventually earning her own
Australian radio show. "Helen Reddy Sings" aired twice weekly on the
Australian Broadcasting Commission.
In 1966
Helen won a trip to New York in an Austalian Bandstand International contest
and, though she met with little success during this excursion, did meet and
marry second husband Jeff Wald, a manager and an agent with the William Morris
talent agency. They
married the following year and went to Los Angeles. Helen converted to Judaism
before the marriage.
Wald
worked Helen into a few performances on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson(1962),
fifteen appearances total, and the resulting attention earned her her first hit
with a top version of "I Don't Know How to Love Him" from the
Broadway rock musical "Jesus Christ Superstar" in February 1972. Signed by Capitol Records, she
enjoyed hit after hit throughout the early 70s, with "Delta Dawn"
(1973) and "Angie Baby" (1974) also reaching #1. In
1973 Helen had her own summer-replacement variety show and was a popular hostess
for a time on NBC's late-night variety show The Midnight Special(1972). She
tried to parlay her singing success into a film career but the pretty,
wholesome-looking entertainer received only a mild reception for the Disney
children's film Meu Amigo, o Dragão(1977) and it went no further.
In 1982,
she divorced Wald and married a third time the following year to drummer Milton
Ruth. Helen has
ventured on into the concert and symphony orchestra forums as well as becoming
a popular cabaret and nightclub attraction. In recent years she has graced a
number of musical theater productions both on Broadway and in London's West
End. Over the years she has been considered a primary
interpreter of English playwright Willy Russell, having appeared in four
productions of his one-woman show "Shirley Valentine." Other live
musical productions have included "Anything Goes," "Call Me
Madam," "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" and Russell's "Blood
Brothers", in which she made her Broadway debut. In 2002 she retired from the
business and moved to her native Australia to work as a practicing
hypnotherapist and motivational speaker. As of 2017 Reddy was diagnosed with
dementia and she moved to the Motion Picture and Television Fund's Samuel
Goldwyn Center for Behavioral Health in Woodland Hills, California.
Hold me in your arms for a little while
Stay until the early morning light
I’ll hold you in my heart forever
If you hold me in your dreams tonight
I know you’ve got a lot of other ladies
I know I’m not the only one in sight
But hold them off at least until tomorrow
And hold me in your dreams tonight
You can lie to me and tell me that you love me
You can say that I’m the best you’ve ever known
I swear I’ll never hold you to a single word you’re saying,
but it makes it so much easier for me to be alone
Hold me in your arms for a little while
Stay until the early morning light
I’ll hold you in my heart forever
If you hold me in your dreams tonight