| Nicky Hopkins |
| Background
information |
| Born |
24 February 1944 |
| Origin |
Harlesden, North
West London |
| Died |
September 6, 1994 (aged 50) |
| Genre(s) |
Rock |
| Occupation(s) |
Session
musician |
| Instrument(s) |
Keyboard |
| Years active |
1960s — 1985 |
Associated
acts |
Rolling Stones, The Who,
Beatles,
Jeff
Beck, Neil Young, Jefferson
Airplane, The
Kinks |
Nicholas Christian 'Nicky' Hopkins (February
24, 1944 at
the Park Royal Hospital, Harlesden, North
London – September
6, 1994 in Nashville, Tennessee, USA) was an English musician who
featured on scores of the most important British and American popular
music recordings of the 1960s and 1970s, playing piano and organ. He is regarded
as one of the most important session musicians in rock
history, playing on countless hit recordings by leading British and
American acts.
Biography
Nicky Hopkins started his musical career in the early 1960s as
the pianist with Screaming Lord Sutch's
Savages, which also included Ritchie
Blackmore (founder of Deep Purple). He then joined The Cyril
Davies All Stars, one of the first British rhythm
& blues bands, and played piano on their Country Line
Special LP.
He had suffered from Crohn's disease since his youth.
Poor health and ongoing surgeries made it difficult for him to tour.
This contributed heavily to his occupational preference for studio work.
He began his career as a session musician in London in the
early Sixties and quickly became one of the most in-demand players on
the thriving session scene there, contributing his fluid and dexterous boogie-woogie
influenced piano style to many hit recordings. He worked extensively as
a session pianist for leading UK independent producers Shel Talmy
and Mickie
Most and performed on albums and singles by The
Kinks, Donovan and especially The Rolling Stones, for
whom he gave some of his most memorable performances, notably on their
Sixties albums Between the Buttons,
Their Satanic
Majesties Request, Beggars
Banquet and Let It
Bleed. Jamming
With Edward was recorded during the Let It
Bleed sessions, while the Stones' Mick
Jagger, Bill Wyman and Charlie
Watts, with Ry Cooder, supposedly waited for Keith
Richards at Keith's Paris flat, and the "Edward" of the title was an
alias of Nicky Hopkins (as in, Edward the Mad Shirt Grinder,
Hopkins' star turn on Quicksilver Messenger
Service's Shady Grove).
In 1965, he played piano on The Who's debut LP, My
Generation. He recorded with most of the top
British acts of the Sixties including The
Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who
and The
Kinks, and on solo albums by John
Lennon, Jeff Beck, among others. He also
helped define the "San Francisco sound", playing on Jefferson
Airplane, New Riders of the
Purple Sage, and Steve Miller Band albums, briefly
joined Quicksilver Messenger
Service and performed with Jefferson Airplane at the Woodstock
Festival.
In 1967 he joined The Jeff Beck Group,
formed by former Yardbirds guitarist Jeff
Beck, with vocalist Rod Stewart, bassist Ron Wood and
drummer Micky
Waller and he played on their influential LPs Truth
and Beck-Ola. He was also a member of the
short-lived Sweet Thursday
line-up in 1969.
Hopkins was added to the Rolling Stones live line-up on the 1971 Good-Bye
Britain tour, as well as the notorious 1972 North
American Tour and the early 1973
Winter Tour of Australia and New Zealand. Hopkins is featured heavily
on the classic 1972 Exile
on Main Street album. Hopkins failed to make
the Stones' 1973 tour of
Europe due to ill health, and aside from a guest appearance in 1978, he
would not play again with the Stones live on stage. He continued to
record with the Stones until 1980, and on solo records of Stones'
members up to 1991.
Hopkins released a solo album in 1973 entitled The
Tin Man Was a Dreamer. Other musicians who appeared on the
album include George Harrison (credited
as George O'Hara), Mick Taylor of the Rolling
Stones and Prairie Prince who would go on to
drum for subversive punks The Tubes. The album is a rare opportunity
to hear Hopkins sing and was re-released on Columbia in 2004.
Hopkins did manage to go on tour with Jerry
Garcia's side project, the Jerry Garcia Band, from August 5 to December
31, 1975.
As a session player, Hopkins was renowned for his effortless
ability to give accomplished performances with little or no rehearsal,
and was well-known around the studio scene for his perennial habit of
reading comic
books at recording sessions. The classic Kinks song "Session Man" (from
Face to Face) is dedicated to (and features the
playing of) Hopkins -- the Kinks' Ray Davies wrote a memorial
piece that appeared in the New
York Times after Hopkins's death.
He was a member of the Church of Scientology
and was awarded the International
Association of Scientologists (IAS) Freedom Medal in October 1989.
Hopkins died on September 6, 1994 at St. Thomas Hospital in Nashville, TN of
complications from a previous intestinal surgery. He was 50 years old.
At the time of his death he was working on his autobiography with Ray
Coleman. He left behind his wife, Moira.
Selected performances
The
Who, My Generation
album (1965), "The Song Is Over" (1971),"Getting In Tune"(1971), "We're
Not Gonna Take It [movie remix]" (1975), "They're All in Love" (1975),
"Slip Kid" (1975)
The
Kinks, The Kink Kontroversy
(1965), Face to Face (1966), "Mr. Pleasant" (1967),
"Village Green" (1968), "Berkeley Mews" (1968)
Jeff
Beck, "Blues De Luxe", "Morning
Dew" (1967), Truth (1967), "Girl From Mill Valley",Beck-Ola(1969)
Cat Stevens, "Matthew
and Son" (1967), Matthew and Son (1967)
Marc Bolan, "Jasper C. Debussy" (1966-7, released 1974)
The Rolling Stones, "She's
a Rainbow" (1967), "Sympathy for the Devil"
(1968), "No Expectations" (1968), "Gimme
Shelter" (1969), "Monkey Man" (1969),
"Moonlight Mile"
(1970), "Tumbling Dice" (1972), "Torn and
Frayed" (1972), "Angie" (1973), "Time Waits for No One"
(1974), "Fool
to Cry" (1976), "Waiting on a Friend" (1981)
The Beatles, "Revolution"
(single version) (1968)
The
Move, "Wild Tiger Woman" (1968)
Jamming With Edward [jam session with Ry
Cooder and some Rolling Stones] (recorded 1969, released 1972)
Quicksilver Messenger
Service, "Shady Grove," "Edward (the Mad Shirt Grinder)," "Spindrifter"
Jefferson Airplane, "Volunteers"
(1969), "Eskimo Blue Day" (1969), "Hey Fredrick" (1969)
John Lennon, "Jealous Guy"
(1971), "Oh My Love" (1971), "Oh Yoko" (1971)
George Harrison, "Give Me Love
(Give Me Peace On Earth)" (1973)
Joe
Cocker, "You Are So Beautiful" (1974)
Dogs
D'Amour "Hurricane", "Trail of Tears", and "Princes Valium" from the Errol
Flynn/King Of The Thieves album (1989)
External links
| v • d • e Steve Miller Band
|
| Steve Miller
• Norton
Buffalo • Gordy
Knudtson • Kenny
Lee Lewis • Billy Lee Lewis
• Joseph
Wooten
James
"Curley" Cooke • Tim
Davis • Les Dudek •Lonnie Turner • Jim Peterman • Boz Scaggs
• Glyn Johns
• Ben Sidran
• Nicky Hopkins •
Bobby Winkelman •
Jack King •
Ross
Valory • David Denny • Jesse Davis • Gerald Johnson • Gary
Mallaber • Dicky Thompson • Jim
Keltner • Roger
Allen Clark • "Sneaky"
Pete Kleinow • Byron Allred • Greg Douglass • John Massaro • Bob Malach • Billy Peterson • Ricky Peterson • Leo Sidran
Discography
Studio
albums: Children of the Future
(1968) • Sailor
(1968) • Brave New
World (1969) • Your
Saving Grace (1969) • Number
5 (1970) • Rock Love
(1971) • Recall
the Beginning...A Journey from Eden (1972) •
The
Joker (1973) • Fly
Like an Eagle (1976) • Book
of Dreams (1977) • Circle
of Love (1981) • Abracadabra
(1982) • Italian
X-Rays (1984) • Living in the 20th Century
(1986) • Born
2B Blue (Steve Miller solo album) (1988) •
Wide River
(1993) • Fly
Like an Eagle: 30th Anniversary Edition (2006)
Live
albums: Live!
(1983)
Compilations:
Anthology
(1972) • Living
in the U.S.A. (1973) • Greatest Hits (1974-1978)
(1978) • The Very Best
of the Steve Miller Band (1991) • Young Hearts
(2003)
Songs:
"The
Joker" • "Fly Like an Eagle" •
"Take the Money and
Run" • "Jet
Airliner" • "Abracadabra"
|
