By MaCayla Jablonski, Staff Reporter.
The Delta College Planetarium will host a Led Zeppelin music and light show every Saturday evening until April 30. The show starts at 7 p.m., and runs about an hour long. Cost of admission is $7 for adults, and $5 for children, seniors and military persons. Manager and head astronomer of the Planetarium, Mike Murray, helped make this light show a reality.
Murray has worked for Delta College’s Planetarium since June of 2015. Before working in Bay City, Murray spent time in Salt Lake City working with the artists that created the digital effects for the show. He says it took 12 digital artists a total of nine months to generate the effects to correlate with certain Led Zeppelin songs.
“[The show] goes way beyond, ya know, the bouncing spirographic patterns of laser beams,” Murray says.
The light show consists of 3D animations, and variations of abstract and surreal art. Each design was created to fit the theme to each Led Zeppelin song that is featured. The digital artists from Salt Lake City formatted the animations to play specifically on the Planetarium’s dome.
This is not the first audiovisual show the Planetarium has put on. Last year, Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side of the Moon” played at the dome, and was quite the hit.
“We want to incorporate this theme of music, science and art so we can be entertaining,” Murray shares. When Murray asked an audience of people at the Planetarium who they wanted to hear, the people recommended Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin. He plans to explore different styles of music for the light shows, such as classical and jazz music. They will be doing surveys and taking polls to see what’s next. Murray would love to incorporate original work from students in future shows.
Opening weekend for the Led Zeppelin light show was sold out. The Planetarium is located at 100 Center Ave. in Bay City. For ticket information or answers to any questions, feel free to contact the Planetarium at 989-667-2270.
