Every year, Grand Central has a short light show in the Grand Concourse. They try to make the show as big and as grand as the place is. The first year I saw it, it was a laser light show of some sort that really played on the ceiling. For the past couple of years, the light show has become exponentially larger with the main show occuring on the walls of the station. And those are big, big walls.
Recently, I went to the show during rush hour just to see it in the midst of crowds. Here’s the view just as I entered the Grand Concourse from Vanderbilt Hall.
I positioned myself at the west end of the concourse and waited. Here’s a picture of the walls. You might see that they are reddish. That’s part of the show. The red is a “curtain”.
The first sign of the show is a brief light show in the ceiling. Just moving stars.
And the curtain rises…
And then the walls light up.
I haven’t mentioned the music. Yes, there’s music. It’s all instrumental snippits from a variety of music sources. The only one I remember recognizing is part of the Nutcracker Suite. Some of it was just abysmal, but it’s just a form of background more than anything else.
You might notice that it isn’t a true kaleidoscope as the pictures aren’t broken up into different reflections. Last year, it was; but this year they seemed to prefer large pictures projected on the walls.
Some weren’t as clear as others, but they mostly did not constitute a kaleidoscope view.
The ceiling was usually included in the presentation, but I don’t remember if it ever really reflected what was happening on the walls. The pictures below if about as close to a kaleidoscope as any I ever saw.
But the below is a little more typical of the show.
More in the next post.
-H
Famous Ankles 