MISSION

The Chelsea Symphony aims to radically democratize the concert experience and create opportunities for shared discovery through socially engaged programming, unique professional support for musicians, and a welcoming, accessible, and inclusive environment for all audiences.

HOW WE WORK

As a non-profit and self-governing orchestra, TCS provides performance opportunities for its musicians while operating at an affordable scale. Soloists, conductors, and featured composers all come from within the orchestra’s ranks, and earn this benefit by playing in the orchestra. Administrative operations are also handled by members of the ensemble.

HISTORY

Founded in 2005 by young conductors Yaniv Segal and Miguel Campos Neto, The Chelsea Symphony has established a reputation as one of the most innovative ensembles in the New York metropolitan area. Shortly after its inception, the orchestra was featured in WNYC’s “Salute to the Arts” Initiative, and Steve Smith of The New York Times praised the ensemble for its “earnest, vibrant” playing. The Chelsea Symphony has collaborated with many noteworthy artists, including Clay Aiken, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Tony Award winner Lillias White, Broadway composer Seth Rudetsky, the Irish Tenors, and fashion designer Malan Breton. The orchestra’s annual holiday concert has featured guest celebrities Richard Kind, David Hyde Pierce, Ana Gasteyer, Charles Busch, Andrea Martin, Rachel Dratch, Mo Rocca, Victor Garber, BD Wong, Seth Rudetsky, and Annie Golden narrating The Night Before Christmas by Aaron Dai.

NEW MUSIC

A champion of new music, The Chelsea Symphony has given the first performance of more than fifty compositions and presented many regional premieres. Nearly every one of the orchestra’s concerts features a work by a living American composer. In 2009, the ensemble presented open rehearsals of Séance on a Wet Afternoon, the new opera by legendary Wicked composer and Academy Award winner Stephen Schwartz, in advance of the work’s premiere by Opera Santa Barbara. In 2013, the orchestra gave the New York City premieres of the Americana Symphony and The Improvised Violin Concerto by Grammy Award-winning violinist and composer Mark O’Connor—a performance that was featured in The Wall Street Journal. The Chelsea Symphony’s debut studio recording, Joy and Sorrow, a collection of world premiere compositions by renowned composer David Chesky, was released in September 2015. In the 2014-2015 season, the orchestra initiated a composition competition for early-career composers adjudicated by Conductor Laureate of the Seattle Symphony and music director of the All-Star Orchestra Gerard Schwarz.

TCS has now sponsored six competitions whose winners include: Mike Boyman, Paul Frucht, Danny Gray, Samuel R. Beebe, Aaron Israel Levin, and in the 2019-20 season, Sam Wu, whose performance was postponed due to COVID and will be rescheduled when concerts are able to resume. More information including runner-ups for each year can be found on the TCS Composition Competition page.

REACH

While maintaining its home base in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, the orchestra continues to broaden its reach. The ensemble made its Lincoln Center debut in 2011, and has presented concerts at the United Nations, Bargemusic, Symphony Space, New York Fashion Week, Central Park, Alice Tully Hall, David Geffen Hall (then Avery Fisher Hall), Merkin Concert Hall, The DiMenna Center for Classical Music, on the fictitious stage of the "New York Symphony" for the Amazon Original Series Mozart in the Jungle, the American Museum of Natural History, and facilities in the NYC Department of Correction system including Rikers Island.

In the 2013-14 season, the orchestra presented an educational programming initiative in collaboration with the Harmony Program, the United Palace Theatre in Washington Heights, and the Brooklyn Music School. The Chelsea Symphony performed at the premiere event for the pilot of the Amazon Original Series Mozart in the Jungle in December 2014 at Alice Tully Hall. Members of TCS can be seen in all four seasons of the show, available on Amazon.com.

As a result of its participation in Mozart in the Jungle for the seminal season 3 episode "Not Yet Titled," the orchestra separately partnered with the NYC Department of Correction and began presenting concerts on Rikers Island and other detention facilities throughout the city, being the first - and only - full orchestra to have performed on Rikers. TCS is now in its fourth season of bringing classical music programming to these communities.

In recent years, TCS has been proud to collaborate with NYC institutions to reach new audiences.

EarthFest, in collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History, saw TCS perform under the whale in the Milstein Family Hall of Ocean Life for EarthFest 2018. John Luther Adams' Become Ocean was the highlight of this special concert event.

In June 2019, TCS completed its thirteenth season RESOLUTION with a performance of John Corigliano's Symphony No. 1, "Of Rage and Remembrance," in honor of WorldPride and the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall uprising.

The 2019-20 fourteenth season RISE UP: Music that Inspires and Uplifts featured pieces written in the best and worst of times for the best of humanity.

In 2020-21, TCS is pivoting to a virtual season. See the main page for more information.

The Chelsea Symphony is proud to be a member of the Chelsea Cultural Partnership/Destination Chelsea.

This programming is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.