Party Pack Ice Album Preview Track

A long-standing band of mine, Party Pack Ice, recorded an album last year. The playing on the record sounds great, and I’m currently working with Nathaniel Morgan to finish the mixes. We should have a finished product by the Spring time. One of my favorite tracks on the album had two versions that I really loved, but it didn’t make sense to have the same song on the album twice. So I have released the alternate take of a song called The Stephanies via Bandcamp. Please enjoy the track free of charge! It was mixed and rough mastered by Nathaniel Morgan, and features these awesome musicians:

Patrick Breiner-tenor saxophone (solo)
Eric Trudel-tenor saxophone
Dustin Carlson-guitar
AH-bass
Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums

Out of Your Head BK Continues at Threes Brewing

Some really exciting things going on with Out of Your Head Brooklyn through the summer (and hopefully beyond!) We have found an awesome home inThrees Brewing, and are excited to have an extended run of dates for the summer.

We’ve just secured (and are very, very excited about) these dates at Threes. For May, June, July, and August we will be at Threes on the LAST Sunday of every month. Easy to remember, right? Those dates will be:

Sunday May 31
Sunday June 28
Sunday July 26
Sunday August 30

And hot off the press, to end this awesome co-curated run with Danny Gouker & Eric Trudel, here is the lineup for Sunday May 31. Huge thanks to Eric & Danny for all their work on this–these sets have been truly awesome & inspiring!

May 31 OOYH @ Threes:

Doors at 8:00p, $10 suggested donation

SET ONE (8:45p):

Matt Holman-trumpet
Sebastien Ammann-keyboard/piano
Nico Soffiato-guitar
Sam Ospovat-drums

SET TWO (9:45p):

Michael Foster-reeds
Rick Parker-trombone
Chris Welcome-guitar
Cody Brown-drums

SET THREE (10:45p):

Patrick Breiner-clarinet
Ben Syversen-trumpet
Landon Knoblock-keyboard/piano
Zach Swanson-bass

Video: Adam Hopkins Quartet @ Evolving Music Series 1.20.2014

I had an amazing time premiering my new quartet (which will hopefully soon have a better name!) at the Evolving Music Series. The fine people who run Vision Fest run this series weekly on Monday nights, and the lineups are always worth checking out. I’d highly recommend checking the calendar and catching a show…a nice audience, and very well organized! You can check out their schedule HERE.

And some new music! This quartet is brand new and features Anna Webber and Ed Rosenberg on tenor saxophones, myself on bass, and Jason Nazary on drums.

Video: Haverchuck at Barbes 1.15.2014

Here’s a video clip of (part of) one of the pieces from Haverchuck at Barbes’ Palimpsestic Series on January 15, 2014. Sorry for the audio clipping! Going to be posting some videos of the recent quartet performance as well. Coming soon…enjoy, and thanks for listening!

BeepHonk (Ballou/Pirog/Hopkins/Kuhl) @ Towson University Weds 2/27

Hello Friends,

I’m very excited to be playing again with BeepHonk this coming Wednesday for Dave Ballou’s faculty recital at Towson University. BeepHonk is a band that was formed for a one-time-only collaboration through the Baltimore chapter of Out of Your Head. It was good enough that we (Dave Ballou, Anthony Pirog, AH, and Mike Kuhl) decided to do it regularly (as regularly as is possible), and write some music for the band. Last year I wrote a piece specifically for this band called Airports. Since there were no BeepHonk performances on the horizon I decided to put a band together here in NY (of Kenny Warren, Mike Gamble, and Devin Gray) to have it performed. It was awesomely fun and loose, and I’m excited to do it again with the guys who it was written for. The concert is free and it starts at 8:15p in the Towson Recital Hall.

You can get a sneak-peak of Airports right HERE performed by Adam Hopkins’ Over/Under with Kenny Warren-trumpet, Mike Gamble-guitar, AH-bass, and Devin Gray-drums.

I have some other upcoming shows that I’m very excited about that I’d like to share if you are free, willing, and available on any of these nights. I think they’ll be good! More info on all of these forthcoming:

Wednesday 3/13–Double Trio Bill at The Grotto (100 Forsyth Street). I’ll be playing in two sets, one with Dustin Carlson-guitar and Kate Pittman-drums, and the second with Achilles Kallergis-guitar and Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums. These will be two different but both very fun sets. Music starts at 8:30p

Sunday 3/24–Ideal Bread @ Douglass Street Music Collective. I am very honored to have been asked to play with Ideal Bread in the absence of their bass player Richard Giddens (who very unfortunately broke his hand on New Year’s Day). We did a mini-tour of New England in January and it was an amazingly good time both on-stage and off, in the van and not in the van. Ideal Bread is dedicated to playing the music of Steve Lacy arranged awesomely by Josh Sinton. The band is Josh Sinton-bari sax, Kirk Knuffke-cornet, and subbing for the great Tomas Fujiwara will be Chad Taylor on drums for this night.

April holds three very excited things that I’ll share more about as it gets closer:

My new trio with Anna Webber and Nathan Ellman-Bell will have our sophomore performance on April 4 at the Intuit Series in Ditmas Park.

I’m very honored to have been asked by Tomas Fujiwara to play a concert with his band the Hook-Up (a band I’ve loved since hearing their first album Actionspeak when it was released in 2010). There will be a performance on April 5 at Firehouse 12 in CT, and April 6 at Cornelia Street Cafe. The band is Tomas Fujiwara-drums, compositions, Jonathan Finlayson-trumpet, Brian Settles-sax, and Mary Halvorson-guitar.

And the third event(s) I’m really looking forward to are a three-state, three-day tour with Anna Webber’s American release of her new album Percussive Mechanics. It is seriously awesome music, and I can’t wait to play it. We’ll be playing shows at Cornelia Street on April 17, Windup Space (Baltimore) on April 20, and in Philadelphia on April 21. The band is Anna Webber-reeds, compositions, Oscar Noriega-reeds, Matt Mitchell-piano, Patricia Franceschy-vibraphone, Devin Gray AND Kate Pittman-drums. Party. For real.

And here’s a great picture of me and my friend TJ Huff from the last January February Marching Band show from a few weeks back. Also a party. For real.

December 30 Shows: Birkfest and Redroom…some good ones!

Hey Friends,

As the year comes to a close (an amazing year in so many ways…including getting engaged to an amazing person!) I have just two more concerts, both on December 30, that I am supremely excited for. Just wanted to give a heads up…much more to come in 2013! The Birkfest concert makes the first time I’ve ever performed with my mentor Michael Formanek and my very good friend John Dierker. Then later that night I’ll join John in a tradition that takes place annually at the Red Room. Details:

Dierker/Formanek/Hopkins
Sunday December 30 @ Birkfest
3030 Abell Ave, Baltimore MD
John Dierker-reeds
Michael Formanek-bass
Adam Hopkins-bass
5:00p, no cover

John Dierker Ensemble Annual Holiday Concert
Sunday December 30 @ Red Room
425 E 31st Street, Baltimore MD
John Dierker-reeds
Marc Miller-guitar
Chris Pumphrey-rhodes
Adam Hopkins-bass
Will Redman-drums
8:00p, $5

Thanks to all reading for the continued support. Lots more coming in the new year that I’m very excited and thankful for.

Free Sounds: Party Pack ICE @ Douglass Street Music Collective 11.30.12

The Party Pack ICE performance last night was super fun…so much fun that I don’t think we’ll ever return to just being the trio of Party Pack. Huge thanks to Aryeh Kobrinsky for putting the night together…two awesome bands followed us, and it was a great night of music all around. PP ICE is Eric Trudel & Patrick Breiner-tenors, Dustin Carlson-guitar, AH-bass, compositions, and Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums. Here’s the full set in mp3 format…feel free to download and pass along to a friend. Enjoy!

Party Pack ICE @ Douglass Street Music Collective 11.30.12

1) Ice No. 7

2) Ice No. 4

3) Ice No. 5

4) Ice No. 1

Party Pack ICE @ Douglass Street 11/30 LIVE STREAMING!

Hey Friends,

It’s be a little while since my last post, and a lot of exciting stuff has happened in the meantime. I had the pleasure of joining the Elina Duni Quartet (an amazing Swiss band on ECM records) for a week-long US tour which ended in a hurricane. It was a great experience to perform with such a talented group of people, and get to know them personally. I hope to have the opportunity to play music with them again in the near future.

The Lubbock record is now completely mixed by Jake Leckie, and it sounds awesome. If you need any kind of recording work done in the Baltimore area (studio or live audio) this is your guy. The recording quality is top-notch, and the mixing he was able to do with very little time is perfect for the record. We’re hoping to get it mastered and do a few blowout release shows in Spring 2013. I’m very proud of this record.

Some other great shows were mixed in over the course of the past few months, and I have some upcoming that I’m really excited about. The most immediate is the debut performance by Party Pack ICE. This is an ensemble I’ve been trying to put together for the last year and I just recently completed the arrangements and started rehearsing the band. It is the normal trio of Party Pack (Dustin Carlson-guitar, AH-bass, & Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums) but with the addition of my two favorite tenor players Eric Trudel and Patrick Breiner. We’ll be playing Friday, November 30 at Douglass Street Music Collective as part of Aryeh Kobrinsky’s Nowt Nite. This is a great series that Aryeh curates monthly. The most exciting part of the series is that he live steams it, so you can watch from anywhere in the world! It will also be available via iTunes as a podcast in the next week or so. If you’d like to check it out live just tune into the link below at 8:00p on Friday, November 30. Party Pack ICE is first, so get there early and stay late.

Nowt Nite Streaming: livlivemusic.com/nowt

Some other upcoming shows that I’m very excited about:

Friday 12/7–I’ll be premiering my new trio with Anna Webber-sax and Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums. All new compositions that I’ve written over the past couple of months just for these two musicians. We’ll be playing at iBeam on Friday 12/7 at 9:30p.

Monday 12/10 & Tuesday 12/11–I’ll be part of a 96-hour improvisation put together by the Music Factory. It is an ambitious idea and I can’t wait to contribute (and see who I’ll be performing with at noon on a Monday!) You can check out what they’re doing at newlanguages.org.

Thursday 12/13–I’ll be participating in a large ensemble experiment put together by Josh Sinton at Douglass Street Music Collective. Details forthcoming about this performance, but I am very excited about it. I respect Josh so much as a musician that I’d trust anything he puts together!

Sunday 12/16–Out of Your Head Brooklyn has been going strong for almost a year, and the last one of the year will be my first one performing! I’ve had so many people interested in the series that I just didn’t schedule myself to play. As part of Josh Sinton’s curatorial run he insisted that I perform, and I’m excited to do so with a quintet of Ed Rosenberg & Nathaniel Morgan-reeds, Dave Miller-guitar, AH-bass, and Martin Urbach-drums. Thanks Josh, that’s an awesome band! OOYH is every 1st and 3rd Sunday at Freddy’s Bar and Backroom, 627 5th Ave, South Slope.

Wednesday 12/19–Danny Gouker‘s Signal Problems take on the Branded Saloon in Prospect Heights. This will be our last performance before we go into the studio in early January to record the band’s debut record.

Thursday 1/24–This is the BIG ONE! My Baltimore-based band Quartet Offensive will be reuniting after a bit of a (unintentional) hiatus to share a bill with JERSEYBAND! Don’t need to say much else about this one. It’s at the Ottobar and if you’re in Baltimore I can’t recommend it highly enough. Those guys.

Wednesday 1/30–Denial & Error will be putting it back together as part of Oscar Noriega’s  Palimpsestic Series at Barbes in Brooklyn. I was sad to have to miss the most recent gig with this band because of the ECM tour. Excited to be doing it again! The band is Kate Pittman-drums, compositions, Josh Reed-trumpet, Landon Knoblock-rhodes, and AH-bass. Kate Pittman writes great music, and I have a great time playing it with her. This set start at 8:00p at Barbes.

Upcoming In September…

Hello Internet Friends!

A few shows in the NYC and Baltimore areas coming up in September. Excited to be playing creative original music written by some very talented people who are also close friends. Hope to see you out! Lots of these are conveniently located and many of them won’t cost you a dime! Here are some highlights:

Saturday 9/8–Signal Problems @ Sounds and Sounds, Launch Pad, 721 Franklin, Brooklyn NY, Danny Gouker-trumpet, compositions; Eric Trudel-sax; AH-bass; Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums, 8p, brooklynlaunchpad.org–Danny has some new music for this one, and as one of the longest standing bands I play it we’ve developed some unique Baltimore-house chemistry!

Tuesday 9/11–Out of Your Head Baltimore @ The Windup Space, 12 W North Ave, Baltimore MD, Peter Formanek-sax; Mike Cerri-trumpet; AH-bass; Jim Hannah-percussion, 9:30p, no cover, outofyourhead.org–Happy to be back at the home court playing in this great music series, kept alive by Matt Frazao and Jon Birkholz. ALWAYS my favorite place to play, anywhere.

Friday 9/14–Little Brothers @ 285 Midwood, 285 Midwood, Brooklyn NY, Nathaniel Morgan-alto sax; AH-bass; Devin Gray-drums, 8p, no cover–Really excited to be performing for the first time with trio, which as the name suggests is made up of three youngest brothers. We feel that this strongly influences our approach to almost everything, music included. The few times we’ve played instead of just hang out have been great, so check it out for FREE at Midwood. Nathaniel and Devin are both also playing in a new sextet of mine that I’m hoping to debut this Winter…looking forward to this! Improvisations and potentially some loose compositions as well.

Monday 9/17–Trio @ Kif, 219 Dekalb St, Brooklyn NY, Jacob Teichroew-sax; AH-bass; Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums, 8-10p, FREE–Standards, fun, free! Come have a drink and listen. I don’t get to play with Jacob often enough so this will be great.

Monday 9/24–Trio @ Kif, 219 Dekalb St, Brooklyn NY, Eric Trudel-sax; AH-bass; Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums, 8-10p, FREE–More standards, more fun, more free! This one features Eric’s trio who have been a group since 2007.

Saturday 9/29–Ruckus NYC @ Cooper Union, Cooper Square, NY NY, lineup TBA, 8p, ruckusnyc.tumblr.com–Still working out the details on this one, but be sure to check out the website for this very unique day-long conference taking place at Cooper Union. The conference ends with a massive concert which will feature one of my own groups TBA.

Sunday 9/30–Signal Problems @ Freddy’s Bar, 627 5th Ave, Brooklyn NY, Danny Gouker-trumpet, compositions; Eric Trudel-sax; AH-bass; Nathan Ellman-Bell-drums, 8p, freddysbar.com–Another Signal Problems gig, but this time we’ll be playing the old hits which we’re planning to record at the end of the year. This is an AMAZING lineup with great friends Sweet Talk and VaVatican both playing. Don’t miss!

Thanks for checking in. Coming in October will be more Signal Problems and an awesome new band called Denial and Error led by drummer and composer Kate Pittman on a couple of dates.

Playing the Bass in Recognizable Places…

Here at adamhopkinsbass.com we’re always trying to keep it interesting for the fans of creative music and give you something to enjoy. Which leads us to the first two photos in a series: Adam Hopkins Plays Bass In Front of Famous Buildings. And it is exactly that…me playing the bass in front of buildings that you’ll recognize. And believe it, no photoshopped images here…this is the real deal!

AH in front of the Empire State Building (Photo by Maggie Hoff):

AH in front of the Capitol Building (photo by Ashton Imaging Inc):

And there you have it…two pictures of me playing the bass in places you know. New sounds, new dates, new information coming soon…stay tuned!!!