NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Roxanne Rose is an attorney who left her practice to raise two daughters she and her husband adopted from China. While she discussed the Shen Yun Performing Arts Touring Company matinee on Feb. 26, the young sisters played and laughed in the lobby, picking each other up by the waist. They seemed to be imitating the Joyful Little Monks, a dance in which apprentice monks “eager to do well … put their hearts into their work—with fun and humorous results,” according to the 2012 program. Ms. Rose said she particularly enjoyed that dance.
Both girls are under seven. The older came from Shaanxi Province and the younger from Xiyang in the north, their mother said. They were wearing Asian dresses.
The New York-based Shen Yun artists came to the Tennessee Performing Arts Center (TPAC) for the second year in a row. Again, the audience gave them a prompt standing ovation, and both applauded and laughed and even shouted their enthusiasm. Soprano Haolan Geng won a loud “Yes!” from a man in the audience who hoped for an encore.
Ms. Rose said she had never seen anything like Shen Yun, though she often attends performing arts events. “We’ve been to TPAC here and Broadway, New York and everything, and boy, it rates right up there with the finest.”
She noted the originality of the projected backdrop, from which characters appear to enter and emerge. “Oh, it was beautiful, we were really amazed that it looked like the dancers were just coming out of the sky and then coming out of the stage. It was a fantastic production.”
She said that the total experience was “wonderful, we really enjoyed it, we would definitely come back next year to see it.”
Reporting from SOH radio network and Mary Silver.
Shen Yun Performing Arts, based in New York, tours the world on a mission to revive traditional Chinese culture. Shen Yun Performing Arts Touring Company will be in Little Rock on Feb. 27 and 28, at the Robinson Center Music Hall.
For more information, visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org.
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