CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Connie Karl had been a director of a ballet company, so to see a dance performance of the caliber of Shen Yun Performing Arts was “such a treat,” she said at the Belk Theater at Blumenthal Performing Arts Center on April 16.

“It’s wonderful. Just wonderful ... we feel blessed to have it here,” said Mrs. Karl, seeing the performance with her husband, Billy, who had also been in show business.

“This is the most beautiful, magnificent thing I’ve ever seen on stage,” he added.

“What I find amazing is that China, pre-communist China, was much more beautiful than the way it is now. It’s a shame,” Mr. Karl said. “Maybe it'll come to an end.”

“The way they’ve incorporated the technology into the performance. I’ve never seen that before. That’s amazing. The abilities of the dancers are extraordinary,” he said.

Meisha Thompson, a dancer, thought the Shen Yun artists “exceptional.”

“It was a spectacular event. I’ve never seen such dancers so fluid before,” she said, recalling her own dance director’s teachings and praising the dancers’ musicality. “They move to float with every rhythm, every beat of the song. It was really good.”

“It was well communicated without any unnecessary fear,” she said. Plus, the use of the digital backdrop, Shen Yun was “revolutionary,” she said.

Ms. Thompson said that one might imagine that an animated backdrop would take away from performers on stage, but this was never the case in Shen Yun.

“It didn’t take away from them at all,” she said. “It went seamlessly in one into the other. ... Wonderful.”

“They are unbelievable. They are out of this world. They’re out of this world,” she said.