Musicians, Authors Are Impressed with Shen Yun

BY Diana Mathias, EPOCH TIMES STAFF

The Hanover Theater for the Performing Arts attracted members of the art community when it presented Shen Yun Performing Arts in a matinee show on Sunday, Feb. 7. A cellist, Ms. West, was invited to the show by the mother of one of her students and she talked about her response during the intermission. "I think this is beautiful. I mean, it's just exquisite. Precision, and you know, the standard is very, very high."

She continued, saying she was very impressed, very impressed. She was surprised that the company is based in New York. She said she loved the dance and loved the music. And she found the modern day story of the Falun Gong practitioner being persecuted interesting.

As part of all the dance, music and singing there is a spiritual element to the performance, demonstrating a classical Chinese tradition of recognizing the existence of spiritual awareness. Ms. West thought the spiritual parts were very, very impressive.
'Inspiring and extremely entertaining'

Mr. Haas is a producer of children's literature and he came with friends, one of whom is a children's writer. Mr. Haas said, "Fabulous show. Wonderful show. Inspiring and extremely entertaining and thought provoking." He loved the Handerchiefs dance and the In a Miao Village with the dancers wearing elaborate headresses.

They came to the show because first, they heard about it, then they saw information about it in a mall, and the final influence was that a friend really recommended it. And they're very glad they came.

The Shen Yun company has an orchestra which tours with them, consisting of both traditional Chinese instruments and classical Western orchestral instruments. Mr. Haas said the orchestra's combination of the Western and Chinese music was "Very interesting. I never heard that before. Fascinating."

One of the friends who came with him to the show is Vietnamese. His name is Mr. Debonis and he also liked the show very much. Their other friend, Mr. Todd, is a professional author, at the show with his wife and daughter. He referred to his daughter as he said, "I wrote for her, but now it's a series of books for young adults, say, 8 years old and up." He said the book is called The Monkey King's Daughter and his own daughter said that her picture is on the book cover.

Mr. Todd said he thought the show was brilliant.