“I’m really enjoying it a lot. I’m loving the message. I love the message,” said Mr. Brugger, who was a vice president with Prudential before retirement. “It’s togetherness. It’s enlightening ... and it’s acceptance.”

Sitting in the audience with his wife, Jill, at Lincoln Center on April 2, he found the performance “enlightening” and “beautiful.”

“It’s a shame that communism suppresses it,” Mr. Brugger said.

“It is a beautiful, colorful, spiritual, touches on love and beauty and faith,” said Mrs. Brugger, who was a director with Prudential.

“One story in particular was: do not give up your faith; continue to have faith in the worst of times, because at the end God will come through and love comes through,” Mrs. Brugger said.

“You’ve got to go see it. It’s beautiful,” he added.

The Parkers found Shen Yun to be perfect and precise on April 2, enjoying the presentation of 5,000 years of Chinese civilization on stage at the David H. Koch Theater.

“The dancers were beautiful, they were so perfect in rhythm,” said Phyllis Parker, who attended the performance with her husband Tivis.

“The most precision dancing I’ve ever saw. Precision everything, so perfect, the timing. And everybody was about the same height. All the women were exactly within the energy of each other. It was unbelievable,” said Mr. Parker. “Everything was very, very, very nice—joyful.”

“It was really all beautiful,” Mrs. Parker said. “And their mission is a wonderful mission, to keep the culture of China alive. So we thank them for that.”