About

Short Bio

Krista Kopper is a fanatic of modern and contemporary music. She has traveled the country playing musicals as well as commissioning, performing, and recording works for the double bass written by some of the most influential modern composers. An avid improviser, she enjoys exploring the infinite variety of sounds that a double bass can produce. To that end, she is an active member of the Extemporaneous Music and Arts Society, an improvised arts collective in Kansas City. She has a masters degree in double bass performance from The Hartt School where she studied with Robert Black. Some of her career highlights include performing Gubaidulina’s Concerto for Bassoon and Low Strings with Ensemble Mise-En at the New York University Library, performing Ustvolskaya’s Composition No. 2 “Dies Irae” with Robert Black and friends at the Jewish Museum in NYC, doing a run of A Chorus Line and Spamalot at the Palace Theatre in Manchester, NH, teaching at a music summer camp in Cazadero, CA, doing a run of 9 to 5 at Creede Repertory Theatre in Creede, CO, and performing with newEar Contemporary Music Ensemble in Kansas City, MO. She plays a double bass by an unknown Hungarian maker from circa 1890, a Les Korus German bow, and an Arco Brasil carbon fiber German bow.
Krista was also the creator and host of The Backstage Creative, a podcast that focuses on the people who work behind the scenes of theater. Last year she started a concert series called The Only Series which highlights 20th century composers. She recently released a solo improvised album called Blessed Are Those Who Mourn which is based off of women who have been murdered while running. She is currently working on a book about Robert Black while she freelances in the Kansas City area. In her spare time she also trains for ultramarathons.

Long Informal Bio

Originally from Garden City, Kansas, I started playing the violin in fifth grade and quickly fell in love with practicing and getting better. In seventh grade my school orchestra did not have a bass player so my teacher asked several of us to learn the bass so we could take turns playing it for our concerts. I did not want to do that! However one day after school I was in the orchestra room practicing and my teacher somehow convinced me to learn the instrument. At first I hated it. The strings were so large and thick and hurt my fingers. However I really wanted to please my orchestra teacher so I stuck with it. Eventually the band teacher approached me and asked if I wanted to join the jazz band. Because I loved music I agreed. In those first few years of playing bass I quickly discovered that everyone needs a bassist and bass players got to play a larger variety of music than violinists do! My love for the bass eventually won over my love for the violin and when I was in high school I decided to study the bass in college as my primary instrument.

In the fall of 2009 I started studying music education and jazz studies at Wichita State University with Dr. Mark Foley. The highlight of my time there was being involved with the theater department. While I was there I did almost all of the opera and musical productions the school put on. I also had opportunities to work at many of the professional and semi-professional theaters around Wichita. Even though I had done two musical productions in Garden City, it was at WSU that I discovered how much I loved being involved with theater. I loved (and still do!) the fact that at anytime, anything can go horribly wrong. I loved the drama and hordes of interesting people that worked on the shows. The theater community is vibrant and creative and fast paced and the time I spent in the pit was when I learned the most about music. Many years later this love led me to create a podcast called The Backstage Creative where I interviewed people who work behind the scenes of theater. It was also during this time at WSU that I realized I didn’t enjoy working on the standard bass repertoire that was mostly written in the Classical and Romantic eras. I wanted to do something different, to play music that others were not. Mark Foley suggested I check out a bass player named Robert Black…

Which led me to study at The Hartt School in Hartford, CT. I worked on my masters degree in double bass performance from the fall of 2014 to the spring of 2016. Studying with Robert at Hartt was one of the most life-changing seasons of my life. He opened up the world of artistic and performance possibilities to me. I got the chance to perform some of the most fun and satisfying music of my career such as David Lang’s Bristle and Berio’s Sequenza xivb. I was also fortunate enough to work with several composers to commission solo and chamber pieces for the double bass. It was at Hartt where I discovered an obsession for new and contemporary music.

After studying at The Hartt School, I lived in the Twin Cities area for a couple of years teaching adjunct at the University of Northwestern- St. Paul. The Minnesotan winters scared me away though and so for the next year I bounced around working at different theaters in Colorado (Creede Repertory Theater) and New Hampshire (The Palace Theater and New London Barn Playhouse). Eventually I decided I wanted to not be the only family member missing holidays so I moved to the Kansas City area in the fall of 2019. While in Kansas City I have had the privilege of playing in many community orchestras and theater productions. I am very involved with the Extemporaneous Music and Arts Society, a free improvisation based music and arts collective. I also teach private bass lessons and was recently hired as an adjunct instructor at Mid-America Nazarene University. In 2023 I started a concert series that features twentieth century composers called the Only Series. In 2023, I organized concerts of John Cage and Stockhausen’s music. In 2024, I am planning on doing concerts of Earle Brown, James Tenney, Cornelius Cardew, and Berio. Examples of my playing can be found on my YouTube channel.

Some of my career highlights include performing Gubaidulina’s Concerto for Bassoon and Low Strings with Ensemble Mise-En at the New York University Library, performing Ustvolskaya’s Composition No. 2 “Dies Irae” with Robert Black and friends at the Jewish Museum in NYC, doing a run of A Chorus Line and Spamalot at the Palace Theatre in Manchester, NH, teaching at a music summer camp in Cazadero, CA, and doing a run of 9 to 5 at Creede Repertory Theatre in Creede, CO. I play a double bass by an unknown Hungarian maker from circa 1890 that I recently purchased from Robertson and Sons, a Les Korus German bow, and an Arco Brasil carbon fiber German bow. I recently was able to combine my love of running and music into a solo improvised album called Blessed Are Those Who Mourn. It is based off of women who have been murdered while running.