HOUSTON—Marietta and Ken Schmid were taken aback by the magnificent Shen Yun Performing Arts presentation at the Jones Hall for the Performing Arts held on Sunday, December 29.

“It was wonderful. The dancers did a great job,” Ms. Schmid said. She was captivated by the kaleidoscope of color that helped blend together the stories, the dancers, and the accompanying orchestral music in a most harmonious way. And she was totally surprised by the digital backdrop scenes that were projected onto a big screen.

“Loved the backdrop with the animations. I have never seen the animations in the backdrops with the dancing. That was really quite spectacular,” she said enthusiastically.

“Same here,” said Mr. Schmid, who is an accountant. “It was something different.”

Ms. Schmid is a director of the Methodist Hospital in Houston and without a doubt she enjoyed the New York-based Shen Yun performance of classical Chinese dance and music very much.

Unique to Shen Yun, Chinese myths and legends are brought to life, such as the animated celestial beings that fly off the screen, then appear onstage as humans to complete a dance, and then return to animated form and disappear far off into the heavens.

The revival of China’s divinely inspired 5,000-year-old history, almost destroyed under 60 years of communist rule, yields an endless treasure trove of beloved literary classics, which the couple enjoyed immensely.

“The beginning was wonderful. The opening scene was really cool,” Ms. Schmid said.

From snowcapped Tibetan peaks down to boundless Mongolian grasslands, timeless ethnic and folk dances fill Shen Yun’s stage with color and energy, as resounding drums awaken the dusty plateaus of the Middle Kingdom.

And Shen Yun Orchestra’s unique combination of ancient Chinese instruments with classical Western sounds did not go amiss either.

“Excellent. Very moving, very good,” Ms. Schmid said. “It was played well with the dancing onstage.”

Mr. Schmid particularly enjoyed the color and the drumming sequences.

Reporting by Sarah Guo and Raiatea Tahana-Reese

New York-based Shen Yun Performing Arts has four touring companies that perform simultaneously around the world. For more information, visit Shen Yun Performing Arts. 

The Epoch Times considers Shen Yun Performing Arts the significant cultural event of our time. We have proudly covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.