SHEN YUN PERFORMING ARTS REVIEWS

Life Coach Moved to Tears by Shen Yun

Feb 09, 2024

MESA, Ariz.—Life coach Sabrina Redmond enjoyed Shen Yun Performing Arts for the first time on Feb. 8 and felt wonderfully moved.

“For the first song, I got goosebumps,” she said after the performance at Ikeda Theater at Mesa Arts Center. It was a song a baritone performed.

“I teared up, and I teared up because I felt the truth of what was being said. I just, I think [Shen Yun] did a really effective job in relaying the divine through their movements and music.”

The New York-based Shen Yun Performing Arts, founded in 2006, brings to the world 5,000 years of China’s civilization that once flourished under the belief that the divine will bless those who uphold traditional moral values.

Each performance comprises as many as 20 short performances, some with vocalists, some with instrumentalists, but many with dances.

“It was absolutely elegant and graceful. … They just moved and glided through the air. Their precision was, I mean, otherworldly almost. It felt very divine,” said Ms. Redmond, who attended with her daughter.

Through traditional, divinely inspired music and stories—historical, mythical, and literary—as told through dance, Shen Yun artists bring a message of kindness and integrity to their audiences.

Ms. Redmond believes our world could use this message.

“The main message that I got is that most of our blockage from the divine is our own mind and society, keeping us from being able to connect with source, with the divine. And then we came here to, well, really live our best lives, but too much of society has taken us, and [we’ve] fallen down.”

This is especially the case in China, where, within just a few decades under communist rule, atheism has become the state religion.

Shen Yun, Ms. Redmond believes, sheds light on this situation and this is necessary. “Otherwise, there’s just people suffering, and nobody knows. So, this [performance] is a really beautiful, effective way to effectuate change.”

An Unforgettable Experience

Peter and Felicity Gloria at Shen Yun Performing Arts at Ikeda Theater at Mesa Arts Center on Feb. 8, 2024. (Sally Sun/The Epoch Times) — Peter and Felicity Gloria at Shen Yun Performing Arts at Ikeda Theater at Mesa Arts Center on Feb. 8, 2024. Sally Sun/The Epoch Times

Peter Gloria, a company manager who attended with his wife, Felicity, was also affected by the baritone’s song. He felt it was enlightening to hear lyrics that demonstrate that the Chinese culture holds similar beliefs, such as in a heavenly afterlife, as his own faith, Catholicism.

“It was very neat to see that everybody’s kind of on the same page in different parts of the world.”

The couple sat near the orchestra and got a close view of the musicians.

“It was beautiful to see them making the music and the sounds that were happening up on stage. And I really like the two-string instrument. It was neat because I’ve heard [the erhu] so many times in different movies and I didn’t realize it was just that two strings. … It was really beautiful,” he said.

The couple loved the performance.

“It was very colorful. … I saw it on TV, and I thought, wow, it’s bright, bright and colorful. And then you see it in person, and it’s even more bright and beautiful,” he said.

And honestly, I thought I would never come here, … but I thought I would bring her for Christmas. ... I loved it, and it was really funny and fun. It was a great performance.

“I'll never forget it.”

Reporting by Sally Sun and Sharon Kilarski.

The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of Shen Yun Performing Arts. We have covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.