Chelsea Chen
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With playing described as “stunning” and possessing “lovely lyrical grandeur” (Los Angeles Times), Chelsea Chen has electrified audiences throughout the United States and Asia.
A Fulbright scholar and graduate of Juilliard and Yale University, she has performed to great acclaim at many important venues including Singapore’s Esplanade, Hong Kong’s Cultural Centre, Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, and Los Angeles’ Disney Hall. She currently serves as Artist-in-Residence at Emmanuel Presbyterian Church in Manhattan.
MANKATO, MINNESOTA – OHS 2017 national convention:
“Tuesday evening’s recital by Chelsea Chen in the Chapel of Our Lady of Good Counsel in Mankato was one of those too rare occasions when a top-notch organist engages a-top-of-the line organ in an especially alluring program, further enhanced by a superb acoustic and a very special setting. In short, it was unforgettable!” …. “Ms. Chen’s brilliant program, played from memory, amply demonstrated this stupendous instrument as well as her own awesome virtuosity and towering rhythmic and interpretative gifts. The closing transcription of Saint-Saëns’s “Organ Symphony” Finale caused the audience to erupt in a frenzy of ovations. For the writer, this transcription for solo organ by David Briggs, as played by Ms. Chen, was more engrossing than the original for orchestra and organ!”
Bruce Stevens, The Tracker, Jan. 2018
WEST PALM BEACH, FL “Chen proved herself to be an artist of great technical and dramatic skill. She is personable, humble and simply appears to be one with the instrument. It was a pleasure to be in the audience.”
Palm Beach Daily News (2016)
BIRMINGHAM, AL “Chelsea Chen breaks the mold of organ recitals at IPC 2013 finale” Download this review posted in All Alabama
LOS ANGELES “Hindemith’s gray Organ Sonata No. 1 became … kaleidoscopically colored and character-filled. A Chorale-fantasy by Max Reger was a fabulous rush of mad passion but never at the expense of eye-popping contrapuntal clarity.”
Los Angeles Times
“She played both [Bach and Reger] without pause … building the Reger to a thunderous conclusion that brought forth a thunderous ovation from the crowd …”
Pasadena Star
SAN DIEGO “Chelsea Chen … is not just another success story. As she proved Monday … she’s something special. Sometimes the complexities, setting and temperament of the Spreckels instrument can make it seem like a monster truck; Chen drove it like a sports car. She had the beast, and the audience, eating out of her hand. The organ, in particular, seemed to appreciate an arrangement of Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm,” which sounded scary good. You could swear the instrument was alive.”
www.signonsandiego.com
Photo by Lisa-Marie Mazzucco
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