Treen's debut feature length movie, planned back in 2021 and originally released to the festival circuit in 2023, traces Hopkins's career from his own band, 'The Savages', to his emergence on the 1960s music scene as the go to session pianist (the piano just starting to be used on the recordings of beat groups). It documents his almost Zelig like appearances with a large number of key 1970s bands, including 'The Who', 'The Kinks', and 'The Beatles', even sharing the stage with 'Jefferson Airplane' at Woodstock (it would have been with Jeff Beck, but apparently Mr Beck got the hump and flew home).
Hopkins, who died at the young age of 50 in 1994 (as a result of complications following a lifelong existence with Crohn's Disease) is therefore not present to offer his side of the story, beyond some archive interviews in which he appears modest and unassuming in conversation. Even rarer here are live performances; it's a distinct limitation to the enjoyment of Session Man, clearly a documentary of limited budget, that very little of the man's work is shown played by Hopkins himself. Indeed even his recorded work is sparse in the movie; we are left to experience Hopkins's mercurial talent via session musicians.
The musician's world is brought to life by a variety of interviews, some archive, some specifically for the documentary, including some insightful contributions from his second wife, Moira (other surviving family members aren't interviewed) ; as you'd expect from a group of talking heads who are mostly in their late 70s and 80s, recollection is not always great (ironically it's 'The Rolling Stones' 81 year old Keith Richards who offers the most impassioned support of Hopkins). Hopkins is made out to be a rather private man (possibly because of the paucity of biographical footage) who didn't know his true talent, which doesn't reconcile with his 1970s excesses, which saw him keeping up with the hard drinking and drugging Hollywood Vampires (to the point where he had to fill in for a 'refreshed' Harry Nilsson during the recording of one of his solo albums) and requiring a spell in rehab.
But it's the revelations of Hopkins's contributions to key bands and albums that is the film's biggest delight. If you've ever marvelled at the piano work on The Stones's 'She's a Rainbow' or 'Sympathy for the Devil', that's Nicky; what isn't disclosed is whether his work, which often transformed such songs from 'ok' to 'classic' status, was truly acknowledged at the time, or whether his status remained as 'session player'. Certainly there's no shortage of musicians queuing up to eulogise the late Hopkins in Treen's patchy but heartfelt documentary, but one can't help feel that if he was recognised as an essential talent back then he may still have been with us today.
The Session Man will be released to cinemas from 21 November.
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