Out of Tune (29 page)

It was a grueling schedule. In New Zealand my brother played six concerts in ten days; between each concert he changed location,
skipping almost nightly from city to city and venue to venue. In March and April, David crisscrossed the United States, playing
in the country’s leading concert halls: the Boston Symphony Hall, New York’s Avery Fisher Hall, Los Angeles’s Dorothy Chandler
Pavilion, San Francisco’s Nob Hill Masonic Hall, the Seattle Center Opera House, the Chicago Auditorium Theatre, the Philadelphia
Academy of Music, the Atlanta Fox Theater, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and the Pasadena Civic Auditorium—in addition, of
course, to playing at the Oscar extravaganza at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.

In Canada, David played at the Theatre St.-Denis in Montreal and at the Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto. He traveled on to Britain
in May, giving a concert at the Royal Festival Hall in London; then up to the English Midlands to play at the Royal Centre
in Nottingham, back to London to perform at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane and twice more at the Royal Festival Hall, and
then back to the Midlands, playing at the Birmingham Symphony Hall. The tour organizers could hardly have arranged a more
punishing timetable.

David returned to the U.S. in August and September and performed at the Los Angeles Hollywood Bowl, San Francisco’s Nob Hill
Masonic Hall (again), Cleveland’s Severance Hall, the Detroit Opera House, and Miami’s Dade County Auditorium. In October,
David once again crossed the Atlantic to Britain, playing at Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall, in Belfast, and at London’s Royal
Albert Hall, just a few steps away from the Royal College of Music where he had studied thirty years earlier. By year’s end
he would have appeared in Europe—in France, Switzerland, Germany, and elsewhere—before flying off to Japan and Southeast Asia,
to perform in Seoul, Tokyo, Sendai, Nagoya, Osaka, and Taipei; at the same time plans were already being made for a further
international tour of fifty concerts in 1998.

In the entire history of classical music performance, there can hardly have been a wider gap between critical reaction on
the one hand and public reaction on the other. While my brother’s tour elicited some of the most savage reviews ever bestowed
on a classical musician from professional critics, he captivated the general public. Almost all his concerts were sold out
well in advance and he received rapturous applause wherever he played. At the first concert in Auckland, New Zealand, the
audience of 2,200 rose to their feet to acclaim his performance. The reaction was no less enthusiastic in America. In Boston,
a 3,000-strong audience gave him four standing ovations. At the two sellout concerts in Chicago’s 110-year-old Auditorium
Theatre, all 3,600 seats were filled on both nights. The 150-year-old historic Academy of Music in Philadelphia was surrounded
by scalpers who, according to the
Philadelphia Inquirer
, were selling $75 tickets for four times the price. In Atlanta, David played to 4,000 people. In Toronto, the 2,700-seat
Roy Thomson Hall was sold out on both nights. David sold out Los Angeles’s 3,000-seat Dorothy Chandler Pavilion (twice), the
2,900-seat Masonic Hall in San Francisco (all tickets were sold in two hours), and London’s 2,500-seat Royal Festival Hall
(three times). He even played the “Rach 3” at the 18,000-seat Hollywood Bowl, with the famed 100-piece Hollywood Bowl Orchestra,
an adjunct of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

In New York, Jack Kirkman, associate director of concerts for the Avery Fisher Hall, said that describing Helfgott’s concerts
as sellouts “is putting it mildly. I have been here for the last thirty-four years, and I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Tickets for the 2,800-seat hall went for three times their normal price on the black market outside. Inside, David received
five standing ovations.

But as the standing ovations got longer and louder, the attacks by the critics grew more vituperative. Almost from the first,
they were savage. In a scathing review of his sellout recitals at the Sydney Opera House, the
Sydney Morning Heralds
music critic, Peter McCallum, claimed that David’s success was based partly on “the appeal of the freak show.” He ascribed
my brother’s popularity to that idiosyncrasy in human nature that applauds the peculiar while condescending to it. “Without
the frenzied media and public acclaim which has greeted
Shine
, Helfgott’s disjointed performances would barely merit attention. [The reality is that] his trademark chatter and wild gesturing
during performances drained the music of both its balance and its artistry.”

American critics were no kinder. “David Helfgott should not have been in the Symphony Hall last night and neither should the
rest of us,’ said Richard Dyer of the
Boston Globe
. In New York, a few nights later, Isaac Stern actually walked out of David’s concert.

The
New York Times
tried as best it could to explain the phenomenon of audience adulation: “Mr. Helfgott is not now a great, or even a particularly
good, pianist. If the medium for his ‘genius’ had been chess or mathematics, his shortcomings would probably have become more
quickly and indisputably apparent to more people.”

The British critics did not restrain themselves. Michael Wright of the London
Sunday Times
wrote: “Occasionally, between chords, Helfgott allows his arms to dangle, while he puffs like a steam train gearing itself
up for a particularly steep incline … And then there is the singing. Glenn Gould famously sang along to his own performances
of Bach, but at least he sang in tune. Helfgott emits a dirgelike wailing noise, a mumbling to the music.” Another critic
wrote: “He accompanied his playing with sporadic moans, pitched somewhere between a ghostly wail and a low snore.” Another
said it was “like sitting in someone’s living room listening to them practice.”

And there was another comparison to Horowitz— but it was a very different one from the positive comparison David had received
in Britain three decades earlier. “Helfgott crashes out parallel octaves with an arm speed to equal that of Horowitz—albeit
with an occasionally metallic coarseness more reminiscent of Little Richard,” wrote one paper.

David’s tour promoters hit back hard against the critics’ savagery. They said David’s detractors were “snobs who suffer from
pianist envy” and that they “resented David’s popularity and ability to cross over to a new audience.” “I’m sure Richard Dyer
[of the
Boston Globe
], the acerbic critic who condemned David’s performance, has enjoyed his fifteen minutes of fame. David’s fame will last a
lifetime,” said one of David’s tour managers. As the
New York Times
put it, “Helfgott spokespeople heaped scorn on the critics, who were, after all, always intent on spoiling a good thing.”

Just in case we needed reminding about the link between the film and the concert tour, Scott Hicks weighed in, telling reporters:
“I think there are some critics who perhaps act as sort of self-appointed guardians of an elite culture.” Geoffrey Rush, obviously
feeling the necessity to defend the film’s version of the “true David,” told one newspaper the critics were “full of bunk.”

Of course, the entire tour was a spin-off of Shine and some critics spelled this out. Elizabeth Mehren in the
Los Angeles Times
began her article: “He raced onto the stage with no introduction, because after the movie
Shine
, David Helfgott needed none.” Writing in the London
Daily Telegraph
under the title “Taking the Shine Off,” Geoffrey Norris said: “The audience affection was overwhelming, the ovations tumultuous.
But one central question remained unanswered after this deeply flawed recital by the Australian pianist: who is deluding whom?
Brutal though it may be to say so, Helfgott would never be able to fill the Festival Hall, or even be invited to do so, on
the strength of his musical abilities alone—if it were not for
Shine.
”

Norris continued: “It is delusion on everybody’s part—Helfgott’s, his promoters’, the audience’s—to imagine that his performance
did any service either to him or to the music on his program … When, as here, Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata is not so much
fractured as crumbled into rubble, you have to admire Helfgott for merely getting through it rather than for asserting any
positive interpretative personality.” He lamented that “on a concert circuit bristling with fine pianists, any number of young
artists with genuine gifts of technical acumen and interpretative insight would have given their eye teeth to receive this
sort of exposure.”

A few like-minded members of the public praised the critics. “Bravo to the music critics who have the courage to expose the
Shine
recital tour for the cynical exploitation that it is. The critics are doing their job, harsh as they may be,” said one letter
to the
Los Angeles Times
. But for every “anti-David” letter there were several “pro-David” ones, as debate raged in newspapers the world over. “Sir,
What a shame the critics slated the wonderful concerts by pianist David Helfgott,” wrote Mrs. Ann V. Schlachter to the London
Times. “They may not be conventional presentations of the composers’ work, but they certainly bring it to the attention of
people who would not normally be interested in classical music.”

David, who was now being described as “the best-known pianist in the world,” was achieving pop star-like status. And he obliged
by behaving like one. Newspaper reports said that “During the standing ovations that inevitably greet his performances, Helfgott
often leaves the stage, wandering down to the audience to kiss and hug members of the front row.” David was even provided
with an assistant on the tour whose sole job was to answer his fan mail.

The way in which the tour pitted critics against audiences around the world became the subject of news reports and analysis.
Television crews from Britain, Germany, Luxembourg, and other countries buzzed around outside David’s New York recitals interviewing
concertgoers on the way in. “The Helfgott phenomenon” elicited a piece in the
New York Times
by James R. Oestreich on “the Worrisome state of classical music in the United States.” He wrote: “Rejoice, the music world
is told. Think of all the potential new listeners who are being reached by the film, the concerts, the recordings. It is indeed
possible that a Helfgott experience will provide a first, intriguing exposure to classical music for some listeners. As those
of us who came to music late can attest, you have to start somewhere. But it would be hopelessly unrealistic to expect great
throngs of new listeners to arise from any [of Helfgott’s] sensations.”

The audience adulation was in part due to the fact that people thought that David, after his mental breakdown and alleged
abuse at the hands of my father, was making a comeback. This belief was fed by media reporting of the tour, which usually
mentioned
Shine
. For example, the BBC chose, unwittingly, to reproduce totally fictional scenes from the film as part of its reports:

BERYL: You’re David Helfgott.

DAVID: That’s right, Beryl, that’s right, that’s right, that’s right.

BERYL: But I used to watch you win all those competitions … I’m quite a fan. Do you still play?

DAVID: Oh no, I mustn’t, I mustn’t.

BERYL: You mustn’t?

DAVID: I mustn’t… I mustn’t…

Certainly the tour was riding on the back of Shine as if it were a true story. The official Internet site promoting the tour
told us, “
Shine
dramatically depicts the real-life story of Australian genius pianist David Helfgott.”

So, cashing in on the film we had not only the concert tour—with its six managers—but also a couple of classical albums and
a brace of books, as well as mugs and T-shirts emblazoned with
Shine.
Gillian’s book was sold alongside programs for David’s concerts, which cost a hefty $15. Promoters dubbed the tour “The Miracle
of Love,” leaving no one in any doubt whose love they were talking about.
Shine
had turned David into a publicist’s dream, and it seemed the exploitative management team was determined to milk every last
drop.

David Helfgott Plays Rachmaninov
became one of the biggest-selling classical recordings ever. It entered the No. 1 spot on the U.S.
Billboard
classical chart and remained there for many weeks; it also entered the pop chart at one stage. By the time David gave his
New York recital in March 1997, he had already sold 200,000 copies in the United States alone. In Australia, it was top of
the charts for six months. He was also at No. 1 on the classical charts in many other countries. “Our stocks were obliterated
once the film got Oscar nominations,” said a spokesperson for Tower Records in London.

Meanwhile, the film’s soundtrack, which included some of David’s performances, sold 500,000 copies in the United States alone.

David’s second CD,
Brilliantissimo,
a disk of his solo performances, went straight in at No. 1 on the British classical charts when it was released in May 1997.
Even a rereleased sheet music version of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto which, in the spirit of Shine, was simply called
“Rach 3,” sold 5,000 copies in Britain within its first month of sale (March 1997), breaking all records for sheet music sales.

David was not only receiving numerous recording contracts, but exciting offers to play at special events were flooding in.
The German Recording Industry invited David to attend the Echo Klassik Awards in September 1997 at the Prince Regent Theatre
in Munich. In October, he played at the prestigious annual “Piano en Valois” festival in Bordeaux, France. He also had the
privilege of playing on Rachmaninoff’s original Steinway, at the Rachmaninoff Villa, the composer’s house on the shores of
Lake Lucerne in Switzerland.

Throughout the sixty-five-concert world tour, Gillian was keeping a tight hold on the reins. As the London
Daily Telegraph
put it in a news report of May 5, 1997: “At a press conference the pianist played ten minutes of Liszt and was then helped
from the stage shaking his head wildly and unwilling or unable to give interviews. Instead, his wife Gillian was very angry
on his behalf at the music critics, claiming that they were not taking his performances seriously … She has been criticized
for trying to cash in on her husband’s new fame by agreeing to a grueling world tour.” The tour’s web site told us that at
the various concert locations “Gillian Helfgott was busy signing her book,
Love You to Bits and Pieces
, which has hit the best-seller list in several countries.”