Frieda Belinfante (born May 10, 1904, Amsterdam – died April 26, 1995, Santa Fe, New Mexico) was a Dutch cellist, conductor, a prominent lesbian and a member of the Dutch Resistance during World War II. After the war, Belinfante immigrated to the United States and continued her career in music. She was the founding artistic director and conductor of the Orange County Philharmonic until she was fired because of her sexual orientation in 1962.[1]
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The daughter of Aron Belinfante and Georgine Antoinette Hesse, Frieda descended from a line of Portuguese Sephardic Jews who arrived in Holland in the 17th century and whose ancestry can be traced back to 16th-century Portugal.[2] Other well-known descendants include the writers Emilie Belinfante, Isaac Cohen Belinfante, teacher Moses Cohen Belinfante and the journalist Emilie Belinfante (the younger). Many of the Belinfante descendants perished during the Holocaust.[3]
Belinfante was born into a musical family. Her father, Aron, was a prominent pianist and teacher in Amsterdam who held the distinction of being the first pianist to present the entire cycle of Beethoven piano sonatas during a single season in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw. Belinfante began the study of the cello at age 10. She graduated from the Amsterdam Conservatory and made her professional debut in the Kleine Zaal recital hall of the Concertgebouw at age 17, assisted at the piano by her father. Her father passed away a few months after her debut; thereafter, Belinfante continued her studies intermittently with cellist Gérard Hekking in Paris. She credited her studies with Hekking as having the greatest influence on her development as a cellist.[4]
After directing high school, college and professional chamber ensembles for several years, Belinfante was invited by the management of the Concertgebouw to form Het Klein Orkester in 1937, a chamber orchestra for which she was to be artistic director and conductor.[5] Belinfante held this position until 1941, and it made her the first woman in Europe to be artistic director and conductor of an ongoing professional orchestral ensemble. Concurrently, Belinfante made weekly appearances as guest conductor on the Dutch National Radio, and appeared as guest conductor with orchestras in the Netherlands and in Northern Europe. In the summer of 1939, Belinfante attended the master class of Dr. Hermann Scherchen in Neuchâtel Switzerland to perfect her conducting skills. In recognition of her abilities, Scherchen awarded her first prize over 12 professional male conductors also enrolled in that class; the prize also included a debut engagement with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Montreux.,[6] [1]
The Nazi occupation interrupted Belinfante’s musical career, which she did not resume until after the war.
Belinfante became a good friend of the artist Willem Arondeus, one of the leaders of Raad van Verzet and an openly gay man. She actively contributed to the Dutch resistance, mainly by forging personal documents for Jews. Together with Arondeus, she was part of the CKC resistance group that organised and executed the bombing of the population registry in Amsterdam on March 27, 1943. Thousands of files were destroyed, and the attempt to compare forged documents with documents in the registry were hindered.[7]
The CKC group came under scrutiny by the Gestapo after the bombing, forcing into hiding all the members who had not been arrested by the SS. Belinfante disguised herself as a man and lived with friends for 6 months before being traced by the Nazis. The resistance helped her avoid capture and cross the channel to Belgium and France, where the French Underground helped her make her way to Switzerland. When she and her travel partner arrived at the border in the winter of 1944, they were forced to cross the Alps on foot to reach safety. Her former teacher Hermann Scherchen saved her from being sent back over the border by verifying that she was a Dutch citizen and his former pupil. On arriving in Montreux, she was given refugee status and worked for a short time as a farm laborer. Belinfante was repatriated to the Netherlands as soon as the war ended. On her return to Amsterdam, Belinfante discovered that she and one other person were the only members of her resistance group cell to survive the Nazi Occupation; all the others including Arondeus had been killed.,[8][9]
Belinfante emigrated to the United States 1947, eventually settling in Laguna Beach, California and joining the music faculty of UCLA in 1949.[10] Desiring to continue her conducting activities, she formed an ad hoc group she named The Vine Street Players in 1953, an orchestral ensemble of colleagues from the local area universities as well as studio musicians from Hollywood.[11]
The formation of the Vine Street Players proved fortuitous for Belinfante. A successful performance in the Redlands Bowl by the ensemble under Belinfante’s direction prompted local civic and cultural leaders to invite Belinfante to form a permanent orchestral ensemble in Orange County. She subsequently became the founding artistic director and conductor of the inaugural Orange County Philharmonic Society, which incorporated as a tax-exempt Nonprofit organization in 1954 and began operations in that year. Belinfante continued to employ the musicians from The Vine Street Players in the new Philharmonic Society orchestra.[12]
The Orange County Philharmonic Orchestra was unique at that time in history. No such ensemble had ever existed in Orange County previously, the neighboring Los Angeles Philharmonic was the only other professional orchestra operating in Southern California and, more importantly, the Orange County Philharmonic would become only the second ensemble of this class anywhere in the world to be managed or conducted by a woman on a continuing basis. Equally unusual was the financial arrangement Belinfante negotiated with the participating musicians. All concerts were free to the public, funded entirely by donations from sponsors and memberships. The orchestral musicians agreed to donate their time for rehearsals free of charge with the permission of their union local stewards, while receiving a fee for the performances as Belinfante herself did. Belinfante insisted on this arrangement with sponsors, and that all concerts remain free of charge for all future attendees. The founding board of directors adopted Belinfante’s suggestions as their business plan with the stated mission of maintaining a resident professional orchestra in the county.[13]
Under Belinfante’s direction, the orchestra grew into a “B”-class musical institution taking into account its budget, programming and geographical penetration in the ensuing years. Its activities usually included a 4- to 6-program season in all major concert venues throughout the region, as well as youth concerts, cultural development programs and chamber music recitals in the community with principals of the orchestra and Belinfante herself assisting in several capacities. Soloists engaged to appear with the orchestra during this inaugural period included artists of regional and national repute such as Lili Kraus, Leonard Pennario, Marni Nixon, Dorothy Warrenskjold, and Mischa Elman, among others. Belinfante appeared as soloist with the orchestra in the 1958-59 season, performing the Haydn Cello Concerto in C-major, Hob. VIIb/1. Throughout this period, she also appeared in numerous recitals locally and as guest conductor in engagements with European orchestras.[14]
Belinfante’s involvement with the Orange County Philharmonic came to an abrupt end in 1962. In unpublished interviews conducted in 1994, Belinfante recounted that her romantic involvement with another women had been discovered by Orange County Philharmonic board members. This revelation caused many of them to distance themselves from her.[15] Belinfante was removed from her position as artistic director and conductor, although she continued to direct the Symphonies for Youth program for two subsequent seasons. The orchestra was disbanded owing to mounting financial pressures, and the organization’s concert season ceased to function as it had previously. Then- Society board president Clifford Hakes announced in local newspapers that “The Orange County Philharmonic Society will continue to operate entirely independent of any artists and orchestras we may represent...”[16] The organization became an impresario presenter starting with the 1962-63 season and has remained so to this day.
Belinfante's recorded output was sparse and poorly maintained. None of the pre-war recorded radio performances survive, and only the very last recording of her American career is preserved in archive. [17] However, more than three decades of critical reviews exist internationally that document Belinfante's superlative musical gifts.[18] Her conducting technique was noted for her command of period style, cohesive ensemble, clear and decisive baton technique, transparent ensemble textures, buoyant and propulsive rhythms, and conducting all performances without a score. As a soloist on the cello and viola da gamba, she was noted for her particular insight into the music of Johannes Brahms and Johann Sebastian Bach, especially the Suites for Unaccompanied Cello BWV 1007-1012. Belinfante’s solo, concerto and chamber performances were characterized by a singular beauty of tone, faultless intonation and legato, complete technique, profound involvement with the music, and an expressive interpretation free of mannerism. Her repertoire spanned all periods and media including works from the Baroque to contemporary living composers of the period, especially those working in Holland and France and in particular her close association with Dutch composer Henriëtte Bosmans.[19]
Belinfante continued her musical activities on a limited scale after her dismissal from the Orange County Philharmonic. A devoted and inspiring teacher, Belinfante established a private studio in Laguna Beach that trained numerous musicians. She also joined the board of directors of the Laguna Beach Chamber Music Society, acting as booking agent and artistic advisor to that group for more than 20 years.[20]
Despite obvious setbacks, Belinfante remained philosophical summing up her career in a Los Angeles Times interview: "It was just too early for me. I should be born again. I could have done more, that's what saddens me. But I'm not an unhappy person. I look for the next thing to do. There's always something still to do."[21]
Belinfante often discussed her philosophy of art in print, on television, in film and before the public. She believed that a high moral value existed in music and in all art, and that what made music beautiful was its expression of the truth, selflessness and nobility inherent in the human spirit. She firmly believed that all human conflict could be resolved peacefully and that great art, music in particular, was a tool that could help achieve that end.[22]
The later years brought increasing interest in her history and recognition for her accomplishments. In 1987, the Orange County Board of Supervisors and the City of Laguna Beach both declared February 19 ‘Frieda Belinfante Day”, honoring her many contributions to musical culture in the region.[23] Belinfante's life became the subject of the documentary, "But I Was a Girl" (1999).[24] Her story was also featured in an exhibition, funded by the Dutch government, about the persecution of gays and lesbians during the Second World War.[25] In 1994, The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum officially recognized Belinfante's contribution to the Dutch Resistance in World War II.,[26] [2]
She died in 1995 from cancer, aged 90, in Santa Fe, New Mexico.