THE HAGUE—Tom America, a musician from The Hague, enjoyed the live orchestra at the Divine Performing Arts Chinese Spectacular on Wednesday.
"It was romantic music and I was also amazed by the skills of the dancers, they were very good on the drums. I was amazed that even the women, they played very well," said Mr. America.
He said it was a "romantic poetic performance" and the music fitted the atmosphere created by the dances.
"And the music is in a way very European. It is easy to get into the music. It is not a strange kind of music. And it is very well mixed with the Chinese instruments."
He really enjoyed the soloist on the two-stringed Erhu.
"It was beautiful. It sounded a bit more deep than a violin. It sounded maybe a bit more human than a violin.
"And she played very spot-on and then the way she worked with the emotions, very soft, and then louder. And a beautiful melody. I like it very much."
About the singing he commented, "And these are also very beautiful melodies and easy to recognize for the European ears.
"So there's not such a big difference in that kind of Chinese music. Of course, I think the hard-core cultural Chinese music is much different from our music, but in a way we have the same taste," he said.
He also liked the colors in the show.
"The way the colors were used and the costumes it was very well done."
Mr. America said he liked the word "compassion" that was shown in the Falun Gong performance.
"I think that is very important for the planet as a whole to have compassion. And I think it is about wisdom. And it's about pain so it's not about easy things. It is about the deeper things in life.
"I think it is very good to have a performance about these subjects because there is so much entertainment already and this goes deeper," he said.
For information about upcoming Divine Performing Arts shows, please visit: www.DivinePerformingArts.org.
The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of the Chinese Spectacular. For our complete coverage please visit: http://en.epochtimes.com/features/dpa2008/
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