David Helfgott OAM (born 19 May 1947) is an Australian concert pianist whose life inspired the Academy Award-winning film Shine, in which he was portrayed by actors Geoffrey Rush, Noah Taylor and Alex Rafalowicz.
[4] In 1983, his brother Les Helfgott found him a job working at a Perth wine bar called Riccardo's.
[5][6][7] Helfgott was the subject of the 1996 film Shine, which dealt with the pianist's formative years and struggle with mental illness.
Helfgott was portrayed by actors Geoffrey Rush (adult), Noah Taylor (teenager) and Alex Rafalowicz (child).
"[10] Helfgott generally prefers to perform Romantic music, mostly Mussorgsky, Rachmaninoff, Chopin, Liszt, Schumann and Rimsky-Korsakov.
In 1997, critic Anthony Tommasini noted that Helfgott "stares into the hall and renders a nonstop commentary of grunts, groans and mutterings".
[11] Of a 1997 Helfgott recital in New Zealand, critic Denis Dutton wrote, "If, as Goethe claimed, architecture is frozen music, David Helfgott is the musician who finally proves the converse: that music can also be melted architecture – a structureless rubble of notes.