Charles Busch Leads THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS with The Chelsea Symphony, 12/11

The Chelsea Symphony has announced its Fourth Annual Winter Concert on Friday, December 11 at 8 PM, at St. Paul's Church. The program will feature actor/playwright and drag legend Charles Busch in Aaron Dai's holiday favorite, the Night Before Christmas, following a tradition of celebrated guest narrators: Ana Gasteyer, David Hyde Pierce and Richard Kind. New York Times lauded flautist Jesse Schiffman will perform Mozart's First Flute Concerto and the program will be rounded out with the overture to the Marriage of Figaro and the Nutcracker Suite. The concert will be performed without intermission and will feature four conductors rotating from positions within the orchestra to the podium and back: Music Director Miguel Campos Neto, Ankush Kumar Bahl, Kyunghun Kim and Mark Seto.

The Chelsea Symphony, hailed as "a daring orchestral experiment" by Chelsea Now, and described as "vibrant" by the New York Times, continues to defy categorization. In addition to performing a regular classical series at its home base in Chelsea, this versatile young orchestra recently presented critically acclaimed concerts at Bargemusic in Brooklyn and collaborated with legendary Wicked composer and Academy Award recipient Stephen Schwartz. Other performances have included special concerts with American Idol star Clay Aiken, violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, singer Lillias White and fashion designer Malan Breton.

The Chelsea Symphony is a non-profit, self-governing group of gifted musicians dedicated to producing performances of the highest quality and showcasing fellow orchestra members as conductors, soloists and composers. The Chelsea Symphony aims to be a cultural focus for Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood and to present vibrant concerts of inspiring symphonic music both old and new.

The remainder of the Chelsea Symphony's regular 2009-10 season is scheduled as follows: Romeo and Juliet on Valentine's Day on February 13 at 8pm and February 14 at 3pm; Love, the Magician on March 27 at 8pm and March 28 at 3pm; A Midsummer Night's Dream on June 5 at 8pm and June 6 at 3pm

The concert will take place at St. Paul's Church at 315 West 22nd St. Tickets to the event are free, with a suggested donation of $20.

Charles Busch is the author and star of such plays as The Lady in Question, Red Scare on Sunset and Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, which ran five years and is one of the longest running plays in Off-Broadway history. The Tale of the Allergist's Wife ran for 777 performances on Broadway and won Mr. Busch the Outer Circle Critics John Gassner Award and received a Tony nomination for Best Play. In 2003, Mr. Busch received a special Drama Desk Award for career achievement as both performer and playwright. Mr. Busch made his directorial debut with the film A Very Serious Person, which premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival, where it won an honorable mention. He is also the subject of the documentary film The Lady in Question is Charles Busch. His latest play The Third Story was produced in 2009 by MCC at the Lortel Theatre. For more information on Charles Busch, visit his website at www.charlesbusch.com.

For more information about these concerts or The Chelsea Symphony, please contact Executive Director Julia Koo at juliakoo@chelseasymphony.org or visit www.ChelseaSymphony.org.

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