In troubled times, Canadian icon Beverly Glenn-Copeland asks us to find our courage
The legendary singer, composer and transgender activist concludes our Queer Pride Inside series
CBC Arts Presents Queer Pride Inside: A Buddies in Bad Times Cabaret was a virtual cabaret featuring over a dozen LGBTQ Canadian artists that CBC Arts produced in partnership with Buddies in Bad Times this past June in celebration of Pride Month. Over the course of the summer, we'll be highlighting some of the individual performances that were included in the cabaret.
In our final segment from our virtual cabaret Queer Pride Inside, we welcome a legend. Singing his song "Courage" in both English and French, transgender singer, composer and activist Beverly Glenn-Copeland closes out our summer series in the hopeful, emotional fashion one would expect from him.
If you are somehow unaware of the magic of Glenn-Copeland, let this be the end of that. Throughout a 50-year recording career, his music has defied categorization and genre, its only constant being a unique fusion of vision, technology, spirituality and place. His work has been gathering momentum in recent years thanks to a reissue of the folk-jazz of his 1970 debut self-titled album and the discovery of his acclaimed 1986 album Keyboard Fantasies.
Last year, CBC Arts proudly named Glenn-Copeland one of Canada's true Super Queeroes in our interactive project celebrating LGBTQ artists from this country.
"I feel like he's the Queero we all need because he reminds us that we can do something. And we have a lot of compassion in our generation and if we activate that we can make a lot of change," said performer, playwright and wandering poet Stephen Jackman-Torkoff in tribute to Glenn-Copeland. "Thank you Glenn for all the music you've created, all the space that you've created for people. Thank you for never stopping making music. I'm glad it's been a long road with this. And thank you for being one of the kindest, most compassionate people I know."
Bon courage until next summer, queers, when hopefully Pride won't need to go inside.
See CBC Arts Presents Queer Pride Inside: A Buddies in Bad Times Cabaret in its entirety on CBC Gem.
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