Helicon (Record Label)

Helicon operates across recorded music, artist development, management, booking, manufacturing, and live performance. Its business model historically combined work with Israeli artists and representation of international catalogs, whose revenue helped support the development of Hebrew-language albums.[1][2]

The company now presents itself as Helicon Aroma Music Group. Its official website includes singles, albums, playlists, a store, and Israeli, international, and classical vinyl archives, reflecting the range of activities that developed from the original record label.[3]

Brown and Elshiech formally launched Helicon on April 1, 1985, working initially from a small room inside the Israforn factory in Holon.[1] The setting was significant: Elshiech's father, Naftali, had founded Israforn, described as Israel's first record-pressing factory, giving the new label immediate proximity to physical manufacturing infrastructure.[1]

Brown brought to the venture several years of senior industry experience. He had joined CBS Records in 1978 and rose to a vice-president role, gaining exposure to CBS offices across Europe and the United States.[2] Despite opportunities to pursue an international executive career, he said he wanted to remain in Israel rather than be assigned abroad, and described founding an independent company as the way to live on his own terms while staying in the country.[2]

From the outset, Brown articulated a distinctive philosophy: Helicon would offer a broad package of services under one roof, covering not only album production but also personal management and live-performance booking.[2] The company would select artists carefully rather than signing dozens each year, treating professional expertise as its main asset—one that, in Brown's account, helped artists develop lasting careers rather than brief chart runs.[2]

When Brown decided to establish Helicon, he signed Rita and Rami Kleinstein as its first artists, even though both were then virtually unknown.[6] Rita's self-titled debut album, recorded in 1985 and 1986 and released by Helicon in April 1986, was among the label's first releases.[6] Rami Kleinstein wrote and produced the album, which introduced Rita as a fully formed diva and blended her Persian background with Western-influenced songwriting.[7]

Preceding the album were two singles, "Betrayal" ("Bagida") and "Sailor's Beloved Song" ("Shir Ahuvat Hasapan"), both of which were successful.[6] Approximately 120 studio hours went into producing "Betrayal," which rose directly to the top of Israeli radio hit parades and remained there for more than two months—a run described at the time as unprecedented.[8] That success and the popularity of "Sailor's Beloved Song" led to Rita's invitation to compete in Israel's 1986 Eurovision preselection.[8]

For the preselection, Rita performed "The Escape Route" ("Shvil Habriha"), a song with an unusual origin: it had begun as a Kleinstein melody intended for the album, but lyrics had not been found as recording days approached. Producer Michal Brant, who had no prior experience writing lyrics, composed them herself under time pressure; she later recalled that it took "maybe a day, maybe an hour."[8] Rita and Kleinstein liked the words, and Rita recorded and performed the song, placing fourth in the preselection but becoming a sensation in the process.[8]

The debut album followed soon afterward, and a few months later Kleinstein's own album, "On the Day of the Bomb," also appeared on Helicon. Both became bestsellers and helped bring the label wide recognition among Israeli artists.[2]

By 2003, Helicon had grown into a group of related companies with overlapping but not identical ownership.[1] Its activities encompassed record production and release, representation of Israeli artists, artist management and booking, and physical CD manufacturing.[1] The principal divisions included Helicon Records, which represented the international majors Universal and EMI in Israel; Helicon Canaan, which managed Israeli artists' artistic and business careers and arranged bookings; and ABCD, a CD-manufacturing plant co-owned by Helicon and other parties.[1]

Representing international labels was a deliberate economic decision. Brown noted that producing a Hebrew-language album cost nearly as much as producing one for an international artist, making the local market alone too small to sustain the company's ambitions.[1] A 2010 interview added that Helicon's international department had at various points represented Virgin, A&M, and PolyGram, and that the cash flow from international representation helped cover the costs of developing Hebrew-language artists.[2]

Over its first two decades, Helicon assembled one of the most prominent rosters in Israeli popular music. By 2004, its signed artists included Rita, Rami Kleinstein, Yehudit Ravitz, Aviv Geffen, Arkadi Duchin, Ivri Lider, Subliminal and the Shadow, Ninet Tayeb, Roni, and Mashina.[5] That year, veteran singer Yehuda Poliker moved to Helicon after 22 years with rival label NMC; his manager cited the label's combined record-company and booking services as a key attraction. Poliker's arrival was described at the time as making Helicon Israel's leading and largest record company.[5]

The Idan Raichel Project became one of the label's most commercially significant releases of the 2000s. Helicon producer Guy Gidor received Raichel's four-song sample tape, saw potential, and asked him to add seven more songs; the expanded album was then remixed in a London studio and released in Israel in December 2002.[9] The first single quickly reached the top of local charts, and by the end of February 2003 the album had sold over 25,000 copies.[9] By 2009, Raichel had sold more than 300,000 discs, earning gold and platinum awards in Israel and abroad.[10] In a 2015 interview, Raichel thanked Helicon for twelve years of support and credited the label with giving him substantial creative freedom.[11]

In 2006, Helicon produced a special 12-disc CD set of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra's noteworthy performances, released to coincide with the orchestra's 70th-anniversary celebrations.[12] The label also extended into live-event promotion: Helicon Music Group arranged for Italian singer Eros Ramazzotti to perform in Tel Aviv in partnership with BlueStone Productions.[13]

Helicon's rapper Subliminal—whose given name is Kobi Shimoni—represented a deliberate expansion into politically engaged music. Helicon repertoire manager Gadi Gidor stated: "If we were deterred by the idea of releasing political albums, they would not be released."[4] Subliminal recalled being told internally that his lyrics would alienate half his potential listeners, but said he later felt that his brand of Zionist rap was finding an audience. His albums The Light and the Shadow and The Light From Zion sold tens of thousands of copies.[4]

In 2016, Helicon marked 30 years of activity as one of Israel's established music companies.[14] Its live-performance activities were handled through subsidiary Helicon Canaan Shows, and the label had begun signing graduates of the Israeli version of The Voice.[14] Brown had also collaborated with NMC and Comverse on an online music database through which users could purchase music; the early-2000s venture did not succeed and ended in a legal dispute.[14]

Ownership of the company shifted over time. Earlier accounts described Brown and Elshiech as equal partners, but an August 2021 report stated that Elshiech had bought Brown's 50% stake for millions of shekels, becoming sole owner.[15] The report described advanced talks for a share-based merger between Helicon and Aroma Music, then characterized as two of Israel's three largest music companies. The proposed transaction would have given Helicon's owners most of the combined entity's shares and required approval from Israel's Competition Authority.[15]

By September 2026, the company's official website was using the name Helicon Aroma Music Group, although the available sources do not document the merger's closing terms or regulatory process.[15][3] The website presents singles, albums, playlists, a music store, and a vinyl archive divided into Israeli, international, and classical categories.[3] Featured releases include music by Amir Dadon, Dikla, Odaya, Ninet Tayeb, and the Idan Raichel Project.[3]

Dated announcements on the site include releases from 2025 and 2026, among them an EP by Osher Cohen and a collaborative track by Aviv Geffen and Omer Adam.[3] An online Helicon Music Club offers members discounts of 7% to 25% on store purchases, selected albums at up to 50% off, and early access to new releases at special prices.[16]

In March 2007, Rita and Rami Kleinstein left Helicon and filed a claim for four million shekels, alleging that the company had provided fictitious income reports to conceal performance fees and royalties owed to them. A 2010 profile reported that the Tel Aviv District Court had directed the dispute to arbitration and that the proceeding remained unresolved at that time. Brown denied taking money to which he was not entitled and described the dispute as a lasting personal and emotional trauma.[2]

The promotion of the Idan Raichel Project also drew criticism concerning recognition of its contributing performers. An account of the album's early success reported that Helicon consultant Sharon Malin kept Raichel at the center of publicity and did not arrange interviews with the other participating artists, several of whom supplied the album's Ethiopian and Amharic elements.[9]