(New York Times, August 2009) Chamber-scale Mahler would appear to be the kind of oxymoron that George Carlin once fixated on, like jumbo shrimp. Mahler, high priest of an all-embracing symphonic gigantism, wrote works seemingly ill suited to the salon-scale conversion involved in a performance of his Symphony No. 4 by the Chelsea Symphony at Bargemusic on Saturday night.  More >>

(Austin Daily Herald, March 2009) One important indication all went well and the effort was worth it occurred when Louise Fishman led a standing ovation in the Chelsea, New York symphony hall. There, on stage March 21, bathing in the applause, were Blair Lawhead, his brother, Brandon, and their father, Donaldson.  More >>

(Chelsea Now, October 2006) You probably haven't heard the Chelsea Symphony yet. But if you care about classical music, it's not too soon to rejoice about the Chelsea Symphony's inaugural season. The intrepid, imaginative musicians of the Chelsea Symphony are actually doing something about the dearth of resident music in Lower Manhattan, and the result of one of the most noteworthy classical experiments in recent memory will be available for your evaluation this Saturday and Sunday at St. Paul's Church on 22nd Street.  More >>

(James Wagner.com) Barry and I are big fans of the two-year-old Chelsea Symphony. It has little to do with allegiance to a home team, even if that's what got us into the little German Church around the corner the first time. There were also at least two other connections: One of our neighbors, Blair Lawhead, is a superb violinist who plays with the group and Louise Fishman, who also lives across the hall and had beaten us to a performance, has since lent an image of one of her magnificent paintings to animate the orchestra's posters. It seemed like everyone in the building, including the doormen and porters, knew about our local band of players before Barry and I heard them for the first time.  More >>

(Betty and Bimbo, December 2006) You can do it yourself. You can start your own garage band, your own church choir, your own string quartet, your own symphony. What a relief! All these ideas were reconfirmed for Betty on Sunday night at St. Paul's German Church on West 22nd St., where she'd rushed on foot to see the magnificent little experiment that is The Chelsea Symphony.  More >>

(Chelsea Now, October 2007) As a fledgling conductor, Miguel Campos Neto faced a complex web of musical elitism. Like many other aspiring conductors, he was caught in a seemingly insurmountable Catch-22. "It just was so hard to amass experience without an orchestra to conduct. And how can you go to an audition, if you didn?t have experience?" asked Campos-Neto, 28. A recent graduate of the conducting program at Mannes College of Music, Campos Neto developed an innovative solution to this age-old conundrum. With the help of fellow musician Yaniv Segal, 26, whom Neto met through a 2005 private conducting class, he decided to create a symphony orchestra from the ground up.  More >>

(Epoch Times, November 2007) "The deep and rich sounds coming from these talented musicians kept me riveted."  More >>