Yesterday I saw Shen Yun at the War Memorial Opera house in San Francisco. What an inspirational afternoon it was with colorful, beautiful costumes, rich choreographies and some new impressions!
The notion of “flow” comes to mind when trying to condense the experience to one word. Everything flows – time through centuries, the performance through the 2.5 hours and most memorably the beautiful costumes of the dancers flow across stage. Somehow, in several ways, the performance brought me right back to my upbringing in Berlin, Germany, when it was still divided. The color of the costumes and the choreography with often up to 12 or even 16 dancers brought me right back to ballroom dancing. The long dresses, accompanied by props like extended sleeves that spin with the turning bodies like the props in gymnastics, created stunningly beautiful images. The color combinations sometimes look a tad too bright for western eyes, but they make perfects sense in the flow of the overall performance. The stage uses a projection screen with Chinese motifs and is well included with animations of the real dancers on stage going back and force between animation and the stage dancing.
Musically the orchestration is quite ear opening with a classic orchestra accompanied by traditional Chinese instruments like the Pipa, Shona, Dili and Guzheng. I did see a long time ago – I was still in school – a guest performance of classic Chinese musicians at the “Freie Universitaet Berlin”, to which my music teacher had encouraged us. I remember being intrigued and confused a bit as it was purely Chinese music without western influences, but now I appreciate the performance – and my music teacher – even more. The performance given yesterday by Lu Sun, playing a single Erhu accompanied by a piano, was simply fantastic and ear opening to me. It is amazing what different emotions an instrument with only two strings and a bow can create in the listener!
The dance numbers were a mix of classical dance themes, danced stories some social criticism in more modern scenes. Classic themes like “Sleeves of Grace”, the “Chopstick Dance of the Mongolian Ladies” and “Courtyard Elegance” were elegant and reflected local, traditional themes. Some of the stories told ancient myths and fables, among my favorites were “Capturing Arrows with Boats of Straw” depicting a military scene and “Monkey King and the Skeleton Demon” depicting a scene of confusion and disbelief. In addition visitors saw some healthy social criticism as depicted in scenes like “The Power of Compassion” and “The Divine Renaissance Begins”, reflecting back to the audience the reality that China isn’t completely free and spiritual disciplines like Falun Gong, to which is referred quite heavily during the show, are forbidden.
There are also three scenes sung by Sopranos accompanied by a piano. While the vocal range of the singers is very impressive, the melodies were somewhat uneasy for western eyes. The song texts were shown on a screen behind the stage and seemed to be very spiritual. An interesting and new experience.
There were lots of children in the audience. For parents this is a great opportunity to expose children to a different culture. I will definitely bring my ten year old daughter next year, I am certain that she will enjoy the dance and visuals. And some of the scenes will be good trigger to discuss some of the more difficult topics in China.
Overall a great experience, a fun afternoon with new impressions. Shen Yun is changing their program every year, so I will definitely come again. In January 2015 Shen Yun is playing in different cities including Berkeley and Sacramento before the tour continues – get your tickets directly at the Shen Yun Webpage or Ticketmaster.
StageAficionado 