SHEN YUN PERFORMING ARTS REVIEWS

Company Vice President Awestruck at Shen Yun

Jan 24, 2014
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Company Vice President Awestruck at Shen Yun
Cynthia and Scott Conrad enjoy an evening at Shen Yun Performing Arts at Washington's Kennedy Center, on Jan. 23. (Courtesy of NTD Television)

WASHINGTON—“It was very impressive, very exciting,” said Scott Conrad, a business vice president in Washington, after seeing Shen Yun Performing Arts with his wife Cynthia at the Kennedy Center Opera House, Jan. 23.

Mr. Conrad found the diversity and variety hard to describe. “It was an amalgamation of so many different kinds of things that it would be very difficult to describe exactly what it is because it was so many things,” Mr. Conrad said.

Through traditional Chinese dance, music blending East and West, divinely inspired costumes, and a digital background, New York-based Shen Yun revives 5,000 years of Chinese civilization.

Mrs. Conrad liked the narratives. “The story through dance—you knew exactly once they told us, you saw it all through the dance,” Mrs. Conrad said.

Shen Yun performs classical Chinese dance, a vast system of dance refined through thousands of years, which has the uncanny ability to portray scenes and characters vividly. According to Shen Yun’s website, classical Chinese dance emphasizes bearing along with form and technique, and thus the form itself is imbued with spirit.

Through the dance, Mrs. Conrad saw the story of China’s divinely inspired culture.

“It’s just a really fascinating, wonderful show,” Mrs. Conrad said.

“We’ve never seen anything like this, culturally,” Mr. Conrad said.

The ideals of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism make up the core of traditional Chinese culture, which is not found in China today under the current regime. The rich and profound principles under these faiths, as Shen Yun’s website explains, have been constantly played through in China’s long history, and are thus present in the art forms.

Along with classical Chinese dance showing the audience the many different dynasties, Shen Yun performs ethnic dances from the minority groups across the country.

“I think that it was a very diverse performance, and so that part was very enjoyable for us,” Mr. Conrad said.

Reporting by NTD Television and Catherine Yang

New York-based Shen Yun Performing Arts has four touring companies that perform simultaneously around the world. For more information, visit Shen Yun Performing Arts.

The Epoch Times considers Shen Yun Performing Arts the significant cultural event of our time. We have proudly covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.