On the wings of music, the plot and true story of the film that pays homage to Antonia Brico

The dramatic biopic On the wings of musicdirected by Dutch director Maria Peters, tells the story of true story of Antonia Brico (played by Christianne de Bruijn), the first woman recognized as an orchestra conductor internationally. The film, broadcast tonight Tuesday 23 March at 9.30 pm on Rai 1 and streaming on RaiPlay, follows the events of Antonia who, while still a child, arrives with her parents in the United States from Holland at the beginning of the twentieth century. She has a dream, to become an orchestra director. In a conservative and chauvinist world, however, no one recognizes a woman’s talent. Antonia then challenges everything and everyone and tries to be admitted to the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. After fulfilling her dream, however, her great love Frank Thomsen (played by Benjamin Wainwright) puts her face to face with a difficult choice: choosing between love and her career. The cast of the film released in 2018 includes, among others, Seumas F. Sargent. Scott Turner Schofield, Annette Malherbe and Raymond Thiry.

THE TRUE STORY OF ANTONIA BRICO

Born in Rotterdam on June 26, 1902 to a single mother and raised by adoptive parents with whom she emigrated to California at the age of 6, the precocious pianist Antonia Brico studied music at the University of Berkeley, where she worked as an assistant director of the San Francisco Opera. In 1927 she undertook studies at the Universität der Künste in Berlin, where she obtained a master’s degree in conducting. In 1930 she made her debut as a conductor with the Berlin Philharmonic. You then worked with the San Francisco Symphony and the Philarmoniker Hamburg. In 1938 she became the first woman to conduct the New York Philharmonic, followed in 1939 by the Federal Orchestra. In Denver, where she has lived since 1942, she founded the Women Strings Ensemble and alternated piano and conducting lessons with guest conducting in orchestras around the world. In 1974 one of her students, the famous pianist Judy Collins, provided consultancy for the documentary Antonia: A Portrait of a Womandirected by Jill Goodmillow.