New Year’s Eve Live: Nashville’s Big Bash

This article was originally posted on PSLN.com and can be found here.

New Year's Eve Live: Nashville's Big Bash took place in downtown Nashville's Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park. New Year's Eve Live (NYE Live) has been happening for the past 17 years, and its Event Production Manager has been Chris Lisle since its inception. Lisle took time to speak with PLSN about his work with 4Wall on this iconic New Year's Eve production in his hometown of Nashville.

"I would say, at this point, it is one of our flagship events for the city, drawing in a couple hundred thousand attendees each year," comments Lisle. "It started out as just a live event only up until 2021 when we became a television broadcast as well. Now we're a five hour television show, but it is still a free live event put on by the Nashville Convention and Visitors Bureau. Doors are typically 5:30, 7 o'clock the show's live on air, and goes until 12:30am. We're on site for about three weeks total getting the stage and show loaded in." Since the production takes place in a state park, much care goes into protecting the grounds from the rigors of production. Five days of the load-in and build are just for installing the flooring and ground protection. "We start December 15, because we floor the entire park," explains Lisle, "taking good care of the park; the trees, the grounds, the statues, and the things that are part of the park. Three days into flooring, we start the stage build right up to Christmas. We go dark for four days around Christmas and come back to do production loadin 27th through 29th. Rehearsals, final touches and cleanup are on the 30th and then the 31st is the show. We walk away after the show; coming back the next morning and start loadout, which takes five days. Production comes out in a day, the stage is out in about a day and a half."

There is one performance stage along with the tower for the 'Music Note' drop that happens at midnight to welcome the new year. The stage is provided and built by Nashville-based Premiere Global Production (PGP). "The stage is built by PGP, and it's basically a 60' by 40' performance space with the added wings, crossovers, and docks," says Lisle, "and then the Music Drop tower, also built by PGP, is made from components of their Atlas stage that you see on all the big festivals. It is about 145' tall to the top of the mast where the Music Note starts."

Stage lighting and video onstage was provided by 4Wall Entertainment, with site video and broadcast support from Moo TV. "4Wall did an incredible job," Lisle comments. "They came in well-prepped in support of Bob Peterson who did the lighting design for television and for the stage. Those were intricate designs, with this one having a lot of curves and arches. They did a fantastic job; everything worked well. Then, of course, around the site, Bandit Lites handled all of our site lighting-everything not on stage, which is a pretty big scope itself, including the Music Note. They did a fantastic job as well and were well-prepped and very supportive. Then Moo TV handled all of our site video, so they brought in all the camera packages for the live broadcast as well as for the live event. They provided video screens all over the site, which is, again, actually a big lift as well. All of the vendors-PGP, 4Wall, Moo TV, Bandit Lites, Accurate, Gallagher, and the many others were very supportive of what we needed to put on this massive production."

With the show having grown to this level-both in Nashville and nationally with the TV audience, the level of artists performing at the show has risen. This year, the production was co-hosted by HARDY. When it comes to supporting the artists, Lisle explains, "For this show, we had four different artists performing along with a couple of guest appearances," says Lisle. "Like HARDY, who was one of our hosts, sang with Lainey Wilson's band and with Bailey Zimmerman's band. But really the way I have to approach it with them is that they have to treat it more like they're coming into a television show, like the CMA awards versus a festival in the sense that bring your back line, bring your console groups, but there's no added floor package. It's very straightforward. Due to the limited space we have backstage, we have to put the limitations on them that each artist is allowed one semi, that's just all we have space for backstage. So, we keep it pretty lean and mean and straightforward from the artist's end of things."

The weather at the end of December can be very unpredictable in Nashville, with many years having rain, cold, or other inclement weather, so being prepared is crucial in terms of gear. IP65 rated equipment was an important factor in choosing gear for the production. "Bob Peterson does his gear list, and he had about 12 different fixture types on there, but I will tell you that anything out in the house that was exposed was all IP65 rated, as well as all the site lighting. We used a lot of Chauvet's Maverick line as well as the Strike Ms, as well as the Elation Proteus line. Pretty much anything I spec was definitely IP65 rated."

The thing that Lisle would call out to another production manager is the balance between a live event and a television show. "This is a big, hybrid event because we draw over 200,000 people to downtown specifically for a live event; essentially a miniature festival and encompasses a good size space in this portion of downtown," says the production manager, "while also trying to accommodate a five hour live television broadcast, and all the nuances that come with that. It's just finding the balance between those two things."

Over Lisle's tenure of doing this show, it has grown quite a bit from its humble beginnings to this year the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corporation reported that an estimated 215,000 fans were in attendance, surpassing the previous year's record of 210,000 attendees. "I'm very proud of New Year's Eve Live," says Lisle. "When we started the show 17 years ago, we were very proud of it but to see what it has become is amazing. We started this thing on a [Stageline] SL 100 stage in downtown Nashville, and it was a one day load-in, show, loadout; and over 17 years we've grown this thing exponentially. It is without a doubt, my biggest project every year. But also, one that's very important to me, that I hold very dear to my heart. I'm a fifth generation Nashvillian and that's something I've always taken pride in, especially working on these city events. I've done July 4th for 17 years as well in a production manager capacity; that's an event my dad took me to as a kid. As I came up in the industry I was fortunate to have had a chance to jump into that role, where for many years I did both lighting design and production management. I do really love my hometown; so these city shows are really very important to me. I think they mean a lot to everyone in Nashville."

VENDOR VIEW
Gabe Thruston, Director of Live Events, 4Wall Entertainment
Michael Golden, VP of Live Events, 4Wall Entertainment

On the solutions 4Wall provided:
Thruston: For Nashville NYE Live, our team provided pre-engineered lighting, LED screen, and rigging solutions designed specifically for an outdoor, broadcast-level environment. Because weather is the largest variable on this show, extensive planning and prep at the shop were critical to keeping the onsite build efficient, safe, and on schedule. This approach allowed the design to translate cleanly from concept to execution despite a tight schedule and weather uncertainty.

One of the few challenges we faced were the Tyler GT Truss arches, which required a high density of fixtures and minimal onsite build time. By utilizing Tyler GT sliding spigots, we were able to fully preload, wire and test the arches in the shop. Once onsite, we were able to fly them as complete assemblies with minimal effort. This significantly reduced the onsite load-in time and weather-related variables that could occur during load-in. The circular truss elements required precise fixture spacing to maintain the integrity of the lighting design. During prep, every fixture was laid out, mounted, and wired in the shop to ensure consistency, accuracy, and fast onsite assembly. A few of the circular truss pieces required additional hardware to achieve the precise spacing for all linear fixtures. This advance preparation allowed the crew to execute complex builds quickly without compromising the original design.

For Nashville NYE Live, four Robe Forte FollowSpots and\ eight Robe iForte LTX FollowSpots were used for both front and back lighting. With the challenge of FOH being in a covered structure for weather protection, being able to see what the followspots see became a need for the creative team while working with broadcast. 4Wall was able to create a camera multiview feed via NDI and send it to the lighting designers at FOH so they could see exactly what the followspot operators were seeing. This small addition to FOH greatly improved cue timing, communication, and overall show quality.

On supporting the design & production team:
Thruston: Throughout the project, we worked closely with Event Production Manager Chris Lisle and the creative team to\ support the design vision with practical, field-ready solutions. Our role extended beyond equipment delivery to proactive problem-solving and execution that helped streamline load-in and performance. The collaboration ensured the show remained efficient, flexible, and visually consistent from rehearsal through broadcast.

Golden: I've had the honor and pleasure of working with Designer Bob Peterson and Event Production Manager Chris Lisle for many, many years and in doing so I feel I know their comfort zones and performance expectations. In addition to that Bob brought in an incredible team consisting of Scott Cunningham as Lighting Director & Programmer for stage, Tal Kochav as Lighting Director & Programmer for Audience and Key Lighting, additionally Nate Alves as Lighting Director & Programmer for Media Servers and Screens. Teaming up with them from 4Wall, Gabe Thurston handled Project Management for the entire project and Ryan Hodge directed things on site as Crew Chief. All in all, an extremely polished and veteran team.

On why 4Wall was the right vendor:
Golden: 4Wall was the right vendor for this project because all parties had each other's backs and best interests in mind. Everyone worked together as a unified team and 4Wall's entire focus was to ensure we provided the absolute best product and service possible.