If not for COVID, budding D.C. indie-rock band Night Hawk probably wouldn’t exist.

The band’s lead songwriters—vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Colter Adams and vocalist Peyton Semjen—met in 2020 while Semjen was noodling on a guitar outside her Bowdoin College apartment. Both first-year students at the Maine liberal arts school found themselves in the same exposure-limiting learning pod.

“It was really serendipitous who you ended up becoming friends with,” Semjen says.

Five years and a couple of side projects later, the two front the moody rock project that migrated to the District in 2024; violinist Emma Chun and drummer Eli Burckin round out the D.C. iteration of the band. Night Hawk will play Songbyrd on Aug. 21 as part of their current three-week tour from New England to Tennesse

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