TULSA, Okla.—Ms. Thompson, a dancer, dance teacher, and choreographer from Massachusetts, had a special experience while visiting her family in Oklahoma. She was very excited to be in Tulsa on the one day Shen Yun Performing Arts company came to the Tulsa Performing Arts Center. When Ms. Thompson saw the advertisements she “wanted to make sure to come.” ... She “actually stepped aside from her visit and came to the show.”
The audience appreciated the depiction of 5,000 years of divinely inspired Chinese culture, cheering and giving a standing ovation.
During the intermission Ms. Thompson said, “It is really wonderful. ... The costumes are fabulous. The colors are great, everyone is very together, the entire show is really really nice to see. You can tell there is a lot of attention to detail.”
Being a choreographer, Ms. Thompson particularly appreciated the work and dedication that had gone into the dances. She said, “Being so synchronized is very, very impressive. It is very difficult to have everybody in large groups so close together with their movements and also to see the talent in even the youngest dancers. It was really nice to see. I like that.” Her dance company focuses on collaboration. The company members work together to choreograph their dances, though some dances are individually authored.
Ms. Vina Lee, one of the choreographers for Shen Yun, said in a 2007 interview with The Epoch Times that the artists try to humbly consider each other’s opinions. They work together collaboratively.
Ms. Thompson appreciated the masters of ceremonies explaining each program before it was performed, “I read the program before hand, but it’s easy to forget which dance is for what. So having an introduction to each of the pieces was very nice. It was very, very useful. It was a lot easy to follow along.
“It seemed a lot more personal to the culture, where some dances are just for show, but this is more educational. You get to see more of the culture. I have done very limited studies of China just for college and to see things that were familiar within the culture, and it is very impressive, it is very different, it’s nice to see.”
Shen Yun Performing Arts is performing three shows on the next leg of the 2009 World Tour in Hartford, Connecticut on March 21–22.
This article was written with files from SOH Radio, a media partner of The Epoch Times.
The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of the Shen Yun Performing Arts 2009 World Tour. For more information please visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org
