Mr. Kalmbach said he was enthralled by the performance, and it kept him wanting more, finding every piece artistically entertaining.

“When you show up. Just be prepared to be entertained the entire time. It’s non-stop. Just absolutely wonderful,” he said.

Mrs. Kalmbach said she was amazed by the digital background and its seamless integration into the performance and synchronization with the dancers on stage.

“They really must dedicate their lives to their craft. They’re fantastic,” she said about Shen Yun’s dancers.

Moved by the spiritual aspect of the performance, Mr. Kalmbach said, “It was really enlightening” in the way that it brought him a whole new understanding of Chinese culture.

Each performance aims to take the audience on a journey to magnificent eras in Chinese history, as well as to periods from China’s recent past. Through classical Chinese dance, live music, and digital backdrops, ancient stories and legends, ethnic and folk traditions, villains and heroes come to life on stage.

Mrs. Kalmbach said she knows about China’s communist state today, but was refreshed by the cultural and historical aspects of the performance, which gave her a new insight into what is real Chinese culture.

Shen Yun performs around the world, but it cannot perform in China. Since the Chinese Communist Party came to power it suppressed much of China’s divinely inspired culture to make way for communist ideology.

“I’m getting a better picture of what happened when the new regime came to power,” she said.