Truss & Structures

Truss Rental in Nashville — Custom Structures from Backdrops to Full Concert Rigs

Truss is the bones of nearly every modern event production. It’s what your lighting fixtures hang from, what flies your line array, what holds up signage that needs to stay vertical in wind, and what builds the goal-post backdrop frame your sponsor logos get printed on. Nashville Audio Visual maintains one of the largest truss inventories in Middle Tennessee — with structures reaching up to 16 feet tall and 700 feet wide — plus the corner blocks, base plates, and rigging hardware to build virtually any custom configuration the design calls for.

Truss types & when to use each

• Box truss (Global Box, Silver Tomcat, Black Tomcat): Four-chord rectangular truss is the workhorse of professional production — highest load capacity, most rigid in long spans, and the standard for flying lighting fixtures, video walls, and line arrays. Silver Tomcat for industrial-looking rigs, Black Tomcat when the structure should disappear into the room aesthetics.
• Triangle truss (Global Triangle): Three-chord truss is lighter, faster to build, and ideal for trade-show booths, smaller goal-post backdrops, and DJ rigs where load is modest and setup speed matters.
• Truss uprights & wooden uprights: Vertical members that turn horizontal truss spans into self-supporting goal posts. Wooden uprights for warmer aesthetics (weddings, vintage brand activations), aluminum truss uprights for the standard professional look.
• Truss TV stands: Pre-built structures that integrate flat-screen mounting into the truss aesthetic — clean for concert IMAG and corporate broadcast positions.

Common applications

Goal-post backdrops: Two uprights, a horizontal span across the top, banner or scrim panel hung in the opening. Standard behind keynote stages, sponsor reveal positions, and step-and-repeat photo walls. Lighting rigs: Horizontal box truss spans with our intelligent fixtures, conventional Source Fours, or Chroma-Q washes clamped on. Speaker flying: Box truss flown from venue rigging points carries our JBL or dB Technologies line arrays to coverage height. Signage support: Truss frames carrying printed mesh or vinyl banners that need to stay vertical in outdoor wind. Decor frames: Black-painted truss arches for ceremony backdrops, hanging floral pieces, or themed structural elements.

Rigging engineering, not guesswork

Anything that goes overhead has to be engineered. Our team handles load calculations, point ratings, safety chaining (each fixture chained to the truss in addition to its clamp, the truss safetied to the rigging point), motor specifications when motors are required, and venue rigging-permit coordination at venues like the Music City Center, Gaylord Opryland, and convention spaces with formal rigging protocols. Nothing flies until the math checks out.

Designing a truss rig for a stage, sponsor activation, or corporate stage set? Send us a sketch and we’ll engineer the structure, spec the truss, and build it on site.