Shen Yun Performing Arts will return to the Atlanta Symphony Hall on Dec. 23 for five shows, kicking off the world-renowned classical Chinese dance company’s 2025 season tour.

New York-based Shen Yun produces an all-new performance each year, meaning audiences can expect to see new dances, new stories, new original compositions performed by Shen Yun’s orchestra blending East and West, new couture costumes based on traditional Chinese dress, and more.

It’s a performance upon which the arts scene in Atlanta has heaped high praise.

“You would think of perfection as mechanical, but the movements on stage—everything was extremely graceful, and it communicated the heart of the spiritual belief that is the theme of the show,” Mr. Johnson said.

William King, a Grammy award-winning musician and co-founder of The Commodores, said he would have loved to meet the composers of Shen Yun, who he thought deserved their own Grammy.

“I loved the dancing, and the music was incredible,” he said.  “I would say it deserves a Grammy. I was really mesmerized by it. It would have loved to have met the conductor and the composers.”

Mr. King and his wife, Deborah, a retired charity executive, had decided to celebrate their anniversary by attending Shen Yun.

“The costuming, the dance, the culture—everything about it was beautiful,” Mr. King said. “The screen behind it was a thrill to me—I really loved that. How they mixed the animation and real action together was incredible—it was worth coming just to see that.”

Tracy Beaton, who owns a music academy, said she had waited nine years to see Shen Yun because her husband had mistaken it for a China-based show that would have been affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party.

Upon learning that many of Shen Yun’s founders were artists who fled religious persecution in China and settled in America in pursuit of freedom of expression, the family happily attended a performance and said they were moved and uplifted.

“It was beautiful. Stunning. I loved the spiritual feeling behind it, and I loved the professionalism. I just feel happy and uplifted from being here,” Mrs. Beaton said.

“It made me appreciate my freedom and [think about] how far I would go to protect my belief. These are divine beings expressing themselves through an art form that is absolutely stunning.”

Mr. Beaton said he cried while witnessing some of the stories, which had moral themes underlying the tales, and spoke of truth, compassion, and forbearance.