For 45 years, a Northeast Ohio family has been keeping its Chinese culture alive while celebrating the Lunar New Year across the region with costumes and dance.
Wednesday marks the final day of the 2025 Lunar New Year, a 15-day holiday celebrated in many Asian countries. While it isn’t as widely celebrated in Ohio, the Kwan Lion Dance puts on dozens of lion dance performances at restaurants and community events in Northeast Ohio.
George Kwan is the ringleader of the team, which in 1980 meant him and his siblings. That’s when Kwan’s father and uncles started teaching them the lion dances. A few years later, they became regular performers, particularly for businesses in Cleveland’s Old Chinatown, primarily along Rockwell Avenue, a few blocks west of Cleveland’s AsiaTown neighborhood on the city’s East side where the team now performs several times every February.
Kwan said he remembers performing at the opening the Cleveland Chinese Cultural Garden in 1985 as a highlight of the team’s early days.
“I met a lady at one of our shows this past weekend and she came up and she said, ‘I can remember watching you guys lion dancing when I was a little girl,’” Kwan said.
At Asia Town Center the lunar new year celebrations are popping. @Ideastream #LunarNewYear2025 #cleveland #asiatown pic.twitter.com/Mb4StrgQbm
— Ygal Kaufman (@gentleentry) February 2, 2025
The Kwan Lion Dance ensemble includes a large, multi-person lion costume, live drumming and other costumed dancers. The tradition stems from Chinese folklore, which Kwan said suggests the lion wards away evil and allows for prosperity in the new year.
“By contributing the heritage, the culture of the lion dance and everything that surrounds it — the traditions and some of the folklore — you see a lot of the appreciativeness with a lot of the older folks that watched us grow up,” Kwan said.
Kwan and his siblings still perform the dances and have no plans to slow down. But the team, like the family, has grown over the years. Today, the group includes three generations, as the Kwan children have brought their own children into the mix.
“It’s about family and getting us all together,” Kwan said. “We don’t want to lose it. I just see it as a gift. You have families that have small traditions and a lot of that gets lost over time.”
The younger generation, a group of 10 cousins, ranges from ages 10 to 36. Some of the older cousins brought their spouses onto the dance team. Kwan said they usually have about 15 people performing at one time.
Kwan said some of the youngest generation of the Kwan family, three children ranging from one month old to two years old, are already dressing up and drumming along with the Kwan Lion Dance moves.
“We understand the old traditions, and we keep the old traditions and we don’t let our kids forget the old traditions,” Kwan said. “We’re trying to get that heritage alive.”
