Dr. Christopher Hopkins

Doctor of Musical Arts in Music History and Literature

Dr. Christopher Hopkins has been interested in video game music since an early age, playing video games on the NES, Genesis, and PlayStation with his two brothers. His first exposure to gaming was through Connor Toy Corporation’s VideoSmarts, the Interactive Video Learning System. He and his brothers and father enjoyed playing Sega Tyco Video Driver and SimCity 2000. He learned to play the piano at age 7 from The Miracle Piano Teaching System, a piano teaching computer program for Mac computers. From grade school through high school, he composed piano pieces in the style of video game music for the Long Island Composers Alliance at Hofstra University using MusicTime Deluxe and Finale music notation software on the Mac.

Dr. Hopkins taught high school and university courses in music and game development at SUNY Suffolk, Long Island University, Farmingdale State College, and Five Towns College. He developed the first university courses in video game music for Long Island University and Five Towns College. Christopher was a guest speaker at the Teaching with Technology Institute at Long Island University, the North American Conference on Video Game Music, and the New York Chapter meeting of the American Musicological Society. The independent game festivals IndieCade East, New Jersey Arcade, and Playcrafting NYC Summer Expo featured his original mobile games.

Dr. Hopkins holds a doctorate in Music History and Literature from Five Towns College, with certifications in Wwise from Audiokinetic and Composing Music for Film and Games from Berklee College of Music. His doctoral dissertation, Chiptune Music: An Exploration of Compositional Techniques as Found in Sunsoft Games for the Nintendo Entertainment System and Famicom From 1988-1992, available from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, is a landmark work in honoring the composers and their songs which defined early game music through interviews and complete soundtrack transcriptions. Dr. Hopkins published “Mario Paint: An Accessible Environment of Musical Creativity and Sound Exploration” in the Journal of Literature and Art Studies, an essay promoting music composition through accessible video game software. His interview subjects include Masashi Kageyama, composer of Gimmick! for the Famicom, Jake Kaufman, composer of Shantae for the Game Boy Color, and Joe Calomino, director of VideoSmarts at Connor Toy Corporation.

Christopher's retro game and console collection includes the NES, Genesis, and Mac versions of The Miracle Piano Teaching System with the keyboard, the NES Power Pad, and the Sega Nomad. He regularly sings and plays the piano in his concert series in the New York and Long Island areas with songs from the Great American Songbook, Broadway, and video game music. He is a member of the Game Audio Network Guild. Christopher is a music director and organist at various churches on Long Island, New York. He enjoys spending time with his family, studying languages and translating, giving piano and voice lessons, and playing Wii games online with his brothers, nephew Mikel, and niece Elene.

Certifications

• Microsoft Certified Professional | Microsoft | Administering a SQL Database Infrastructure
• Microsoft Technology Associate | Microsoft | Database Fundamentals
• Specialist in Audiokinetic Wwise | Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences
• Specialist in Orchestrating and Producing Music for Film and Games | Berklee College of Music
• Specialist in Mobile Apps and Tablets | Specialist in ePortfolios for Learning | The Online Learning Consortium, Inc.
• Specialist in Blended and Online Courses | LIU Post