MINNEAPOLIS—“It’s my first time to have been to anything presented by anything Chinese. And it was interesting and I enjoyed it,” said Mr. Jose Alvarez, after seeing Shen Yun Performing Arts at Minneapolis’s Orpheum Theatre.
The retired corporate comptroller for a manufacturing company saw the performance with his dear friend, Lillian Ratalo, a chef for Compass Group. She asked Mr. Alvarez to bring her. “I had already seen the brochure for the second year, and I was very interested in coming to see this show,” she said.
New York-based Shen Yun aims to revive 5,000 of divinely inspired civilization through traditional Chinese song and dance. It not only brings forth China’s history but presents the breadth of China by including folk and ethnic dances from the country’s more than 50 ethnicities, according to the company’s website.
Mr. Alvarez particularly enjoyed the vocalists, especially soprano Haolan Geng.
In addition to dancers, Shen Yun travels with world-class vocalists who sing in Chinese using the bel canto style of operatic singing.
Mr. Alvarez noticed the spiritually in the songs, and he understood that the performance compared the freedoms outside of China to the lack of freedom inside it.
Ms. Ratalo enjoyed “everything. I really like it. I enjoyed it, every bit of the show for me. It was really very good—the dresses, all the dancers and everything,” she said.
Reporting by Valerie Avore and Sharon Kilarski.
New York-based Shen Yun Performing Arts has three touring companies that perform simultaneously around the world. For more information, visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org
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