Light show brings Christmas cheer to town

Those driving around Lennox admiring the twinkling lights of the Christmas season can take in a light show timed to music.

Brandon Trocke and his wife, Kasey, moved into their home in Countryside Addition after Christmas last year. He hadn’t planned on setting up a light show for this Christmas until he heard about the Light Up Lennox contest so he decided to work on a project now instead of waiting until the summer like he had planned.

“It takes probably a solid month total to sequence everything and prep all the controllers. Thankfully everything besides the regular Christmas lights, everything is permanent,” Trocke said.

They have permanent LED pixels installed along the roofline and around the windows. They all blend in with the paint on the house.

Trocke became interested in the light show hobby in college when he and his roommates tried for two months to work on an old-fashioned type show with high voltage stuff. They never got that off the ground but it sparked his interest in the hobby.

When he and Kasey lived in Arlington, they had a smaller version of the light show he has created at their home in Lennox. In Arlington, they had the front roof line done with LED pixels and the regular 120-volt Christmas lights on the front yard.

The theme for the light show is fun and enjoyable. All of the songs are pretty upbeat and can be heard on 89.5 FM or on outdoor speakers when watching the show.

The show comes on at 5 p.m. and goes off at 9:30 p.m. It lasts about 20 minutes.

Trocke has a background in computers and works as a systems engineer. He uses Home Assistant to control a lot of things in their home. Home Assistant closes the front blinds and turns off the exterior lights, another controller controls the show and turns on the radio transmitter at 5 p.m. 

Trocke uses the program xLights to program the show. By using pixels, he can address each individual light. The lights in the yard are controlled via relays. The xLights program allows him to import a song and make sequences or import sequences, along with a 3D design of the house.

He used some of the same playlist he used in Arlington to create the show this year. In Arlington they had a garage door on the front of the house where they could project scenes on the door.

“That was a really fun part of that show. I’ll eventually incorporate a matrix like a projector or pixel display to make it look like a TV or something to put images,” he said.

With his in-laws building a home next door, Trocke plans to expand on the light show next year.

“The eventual goal with the in-laws next door is to have the light show wrap around to their house and have their house be part of the show,” Trocke said.

He plans to keep the show going every day through New Year’s Day. Stop and watch the show at 1012 N. Juniper St. or online at https://youtu.be/t0lTMp-OAF8?si=Iyo4zmmtAMRkrxGv.