Shen Yun provides an authentic experience of traditional Chinese music, dance, and pageantry that is aesthetically pleasing and uplifting.
Mr. Ezard, the animation supervisor on the award-winning film “Happy Feet,” was very impressed with the depth of Shen Yun’s performance when he saw the show in Sydney this past April.
“Visually it’s very beautiful,” said Mr. Ezard. “The human spirit... can be delivered through dance and movement. The wonderful spirit of people can shine through and give us hope and joy.”
Chinese dance is deeply rooted in China’s 5,000-plus years of divinely inspired culture and is the cornerstone of a Shen Yun performance. Handmade costumes and props fill the stage with warm, flowing colors as meticulously trained dancers convey the deeply resonating style through Chinese classical and ethnic folk dances.
Ms. Maria Brissonskaja, a world-renowned ballet dancer, was impressed by the caliber of the Shen Yun dancers when she saw them perform in Geneva last October.
“The movements of the artists demonstrated grace—their arms, hands, even the heads all demonstrated grace,” Ms. Brissonskaja said. “Their leaps were so light—this quality is not often seen in Europe…I can tell what true dance is—I witnessed it here.”
The musical accompaniment is from a one-of-a-kind orchestra with a foundation of traditional Western instruments which is complemented by Chinese instruments such as the Chinese flute, pipa, and erhu.
The Mission
Shen Yun’s performers take to heart the Chinese saying, “To create true art, there must first be inner beauty.”
Shen Yun aims to restore humanity’s culture to a divine setting filled with beauty and inner goodness. Many audience members expressed a sense of wonder, including Mr. Kiujian, a graphic designer and painter of classical and oil paintings from Sydney.“I was crying for a while. I was holding back my tears,” said Mr. Kiujian. “It lifted my spirit up to heaven, out of this world, and touched my heart, my mind, and gave me peace.”
Chinese culture is the world’s oldest civilization. It is saturated with tremendous inner meaning that has provided many millennia of substance for the age-old dance form. Many of the sacred elements embedded in the ancient nation were tarnished or discarded during the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s and 70s. Shen Yun’s focus is to revive many of the ancient cultural characteristics that have been suppressed for the last sixty years by the Chinese Communist Party.
Renowned China studies scholar Qiu Yueshou saw the Shen Yun performance in San Diego last month and said, “Living aboard makes us overseas Chinese far from many things back home, but Shen Yun’s international tour has brought Chinese culture back to us, making us feel warm and close. As a Chinese person, I felt proud to see many non-Chinese applaud this show.”
The History
The ancient Chinese dance system is quite deep and has been developing for thousands of years. In ancient society, dance was a form of showing reverence to the divine and the royal court.
The philosopher Confucius was very interested in Chinese dance forms, asserting that dance should be “perfectly compassionate and perfectly beautiful.” Many of its foundational methods are balanced and follow a precise structural form. Dancers require rigorous, high-level training in order to express the movement’s full breadth and beauty.Common dance in China was originally a folk form in Chinese society in which people danced in fellowship with others their communities. Chinese dance began to flourish and is said to have peaked in the Tang Dynasty, when other art forms like painting, poetry, costume design, and classical music all reached their zenith.
At present, the realm of Chinese dance as expressed in Shen Yun performances are based on many generations’ wisdom and experience. The system has developed a comprehensive and refined set of training methods in which Shen Yun dancers follow a strict training regimen to perfect both the rigorous physical requirements and a process of character cultivation.
The Performers
Shen Yun features a range of performers including dancers, soloist singers, and musicians who have performed and traveled all over the world. For example, Hsieh Peijong, a resident of Secaucus, New Jersey, is the daughter of a famous Taiwanese ballerina, and has studied piano, dance, and viola from an early age.
“The content is to revive the truly traditional Chinese culture,” says Ms. Hsieh about Shen Yun. “As artists, we want to pass [this culture] on to future generations.”
Guan Guimin is a tenor from China who enjoyed immense popularity in China. He recorded soundtracks for over 50 movies and television shows and was named “National First-Class Performer” by China’s Ministry of Culture. In the lyrics to one of the song he performs in Shen Yun, Mr. Guan shares the results he hopes for: “There is nothing we seek in return/ We wish only to share with you a hopeful tomorrow.”
Principal dancer and choreographer Michelle Ren spoke about the audience reactions to the Shen Yun shows. “Many of the things we do are very touching to people, because we’re using our hearts to do it and the audience will feel it,” says Ms. Ren.
To learn more about Shen Yun, or inquire about ticket availability for the Sunday, June 21 performance, please visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org
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