Piano Faculty

Pianist Chelsea has taken a wide variety of concert stages. From Wienersaal in Salzburg and Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, to unconventional yet intimate GroupMuses, and Airbnb concert series, her programming blends classical and contemporary repertoire. In 2019, her performances at San Francisco Botanical Garden “Flower Piano” paired Crumb’s M akrokosmos II with Schumann’s Symphonic Etudes, and Schubert’s Fantasia in F minor for piano 4 hands with Novak’s Rustica Musa II.

An advocate of contemporary music, Chelsea is a founding member of contemporary vocal ensemble Mouthscape Choir. She premiered Ilya Demutsky’s Skomoroshina, commissioned through the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) Hoefer Prize, choreographed and performed at San Francisco Ballet; other premieres include Lukáš Janata’s Echi, Ryan Brown’s M ortal Lessons, and numerous new works. Fluent in free improvisation and focusing on extended techniques, Chelsea invented the Harmonic Capo to expand the potential of the instrument. Her current project is to advance the prototype, while seeking collaborations and commissioning composers to create new possibilities for the piano repertoire.

Chelsea served as a faculty member at New York University Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, while studying with Alan Feinberg. She graduated from SFCM with a Master’s degree and the President’s award, studying in the studios of Yoshikazu Nagai and Paul Hersh, and received her Bachelor degree from The Boston Conservatory (magna cumme laude) under the guidance of Ya-Fei Chuang.

In her free time, Chelsea enjoys collecting rare succulents, preparing 10 person+ feasts, boardgames, and rock climbing.