A planned standing-room concert hall may bring new noise to Nashville’s fast-growing entertainment landscape.
Live music giant AEG Presents eyes late 2024 to open an entertainment venue at Nashville Yards, the 18-acre entertainment, office, and apartment complex planned for north of the city’s bustling Gulch neighborhood — blocks removed from the Lower Broadway nightlife district that fuels neon-lit tourism in Music City, U.S.A.
Leadership at AEG believes the to-be-named Yards room, with its 4,500-person capacity, will fill a live entertainment gap in Nashville by offering standing-room concerts in a space larger than the historic Ryman Auditorium, but smaller than most outdoor crowds at Ascend Amphitheater.
“There’s a missing space in that 2,000-to-4,000 capacity opportunity,” said Rick Mueller, president of North America at AEG Presents. “So many bands can sell tickets in this space. That’s the golden age of streaming. So many more bands can cut through with this frictionless distribution of music. … Bands are building momentum faster and we’re seeing more shows than ever selling out in that [size venue].”
Some of what showgoers can expect inside the room:
- A lifted floor to aid sight lines for those who stand in the back.
- A horseshoe balcony overlooking the stage and concert floor.
- Rail-side standing, VIP seating, and first-come, first-served bleachers on the balcony level.
- Expanded bathrooms to help combat lines, and an out-of-sight bar area for those wanting to congregate during a show.
- Production capacity for live-streaming and televised events.
Similar rooms operated by AEG include Roadrunner in Boston and the Mission Ballroom in Denver. The latter boasts a 2023 concert calendar featuring country outlier Colter Wall, pop act Lewis Capaldi, Music Row hitmaker Jordan Davis, indie staple Death Cab for Cutie, Christian rock band Skillet, and jam favorite Phil Lesh, among others.
Mueller envisions a venue that can host buzzed-about tours in dance, pop, and hip-hop that might not fit in seated halls like the 2,362-capacity Ryman or 4,000-person Grand Ole Opry House.
“This kind of platform is going to allow us to grow genres in Nashville,” he said. “Yeah, Nashville’s known for being a country music town. It does really well with rock, too. But there’s a lot of youth-based music that wanted a dance element that was limited to what was available to them.”
The new venue fits into a billion-dollar Nashville Yards complex that hopes to deliver an encompassing entertainment experience. The 18-acre development includes lodging, dining, shopping, bowling, a public park, and a movie theater.
From parking to bathrooms, sound treatment, and stage sight lines, architecture firm HOK developed the venue with a complete concert-going experience in mind, senior project manager Scott Ralston said.
“There’s a lot of focus on the patron experience,” Ralston said, “because if they don’t have a good experience, they’re not coming back.
The 88,000-square-foot venue features a handful of hospitality amenities for an artist-friendly experience, Mueller said. These include dressing rooms with an outdoor balcony overlooking the complex and side-stage lounges for family and friends.
And while it may be located a few blocks northwest of the Ryman, Mueller doesn’t see the venues competing to get concertgoers through the doors in each venue — in part because of size and layout.
“I don’t wanna compete with the Ryman,” Mueller said. “It is the legacy of Nashville and live music. … I guarantee you fans are not going to start skipping the Ryman because there’s another venue in town.”