Mayor Bill de Blasio, actors Alec Baldwin and Kate McKinnon were on hand to light the 94-foot-high (28-meter-high) Norway spruce outside the building in midtown Manhattan. The tree is adorned with 50,000 multicolored lights, topped with a Swarovski crystal star.

The 84th annual ceremony was televised and included performances by Neil Diamond, Sarah McLachlan, Tori Kelly and the Radio City Rockettes.

The tree will remain on display until January 7 and will then be donated to the home building charity Habitat for Humanity, the Rockefeller Center website said.

The Rockefeller Center tree has been a staple of Christmas in New York City since the Great Depression, with hundreds of thousands people visiting the tree while it is on display.  

ks/eg (ap,rtr)