TORONTO—Olin Damiani knows about the finer things in life, being a custom jewellery designer and manufacture. His Facebook page sports a picture of him in racing gear standing beside a Ferrari.
On Friday night, he came to Sony Centre for the Performing Arts for a taste of something else elegant and world class: Shen Yun Performing Arts.
“It’s a fantastic show, wonderful show, the costumes, the colours, the dance, the music, it’s all beautiful and the stories as well, they’re very very nice,” said Damiani, owner of Damiani By Design and former sales manager at Damiani Jewellers.
“I think the colours are amazing, the colour combinations. And it’s just delicate, delicate fabrics and they’re just beautifully done, just beautifully done—everything coordinates perfectly.”
He said Shen Yun presented a complete package that was “very well executed.”
Besides its classical Chinese dance, Shen Yun is known for its colourful costumes, vividly animated background projections, and an orchestra that combines classical Eastern and Western instruments. Each of Shen Yun’s three companies tours with an orchestra as well as vocal soloists.
“The singing and the orchestra was very nice,” said Mr. Damiani.
The company stages dances from China’s diverse ethnicities and folk dances of the majority Han ethnicity, but focuses on classical Chinese dance, an art-form that is thousands years old and was passed down within the imperial palace and ancient Chinese theater and opera.
“I think it’s very refined, very refined,” Mr. Damiani said of the dancing.
“[It] expressed a lot of emotions in a very delicate way, in a very classical way.”
He said that delicate portrayal demonstrated a notable contrast between traditional Chinese culture and modern culture.
“It shows that there’s a lot of emotion that can be communicated in a very sophisticated way as opposed to what we see today in modern culture. I think it’s something that shows that you don’t have to make a lot of noise and jump around to make your point.”
Shen Yun strives to do more than stage beautiful dancing, however. The New York-based company was founded on a mission to revive 5,000 years of traditional Chinese culture, a heritage steeped in stories and legendary figures, that emphasized values like propriety, wisdom, benevolence, and reverence for the divine.
“I enjoy the stories, I think the stories are very important, that each dance tells, each dance has a message.”
That message is very spiritual, he said.
Reporting by NTD Television and Matthew Little
Shen Yun Performing Arts International Company is in Toronto for three more performances Saturday and Sunday at Sony Centre for the Performing Arts before continuing on to Mississauga for five shows at Living Arts Centre.
For more information, visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org.
