Image: Glenn and Elizabeth
Elizabeth
I am an artist.
My work over the past four decades has evolved at the intersection of arts and activism.
I am a mother, a wife, a gardener,
a singer, a dancer and a teller of tales.
I am an Earth-honouring woman of European descent.
Of my ancestral lineage with all Creation,
I know little: the knowledge I have gathered is pitifully small,
gleaned from books and old women and pure dumb luck.
Like Audre, I know the Master’s house cannot be razed with the master’s tools.
Like Richard, I want to hear everything and nothing at the same time.
Like Lawrence, I am waiting for a rebirth of wonder.Audre — African-American feminist poet and philosopher, Audre Lorde
Richard — Ojibwe author and journalist, Richard Wagamese
Lawrence — American beat poet, Lawrence Ferlinghetti
I am an author, theatre artist and arts educator with more than four decades of professional experience. As a theatre artist, I have toured with Second City doing improv comedy, played the Witch in Hansel and Gretl with the Honolulu Symphony and told my original stories at the Toronto International Storytelling Festival. My arts education credits include work with Learning Through the Arts, World Vision, and the Storytellers School of Toronto.
I served as Artistic Director of KPH Theater Productions in Miramichi, N.B. from 2012 to 2016, and along with my husband, Beverly Glenn Copeland, completed half a dozen artist residencies* in N.B. schools. I was honoured to serve as Writer-in-Residence* for James M. Hill High School in 2015. (*Funding support through NB Department of Tourism, Heritage and Culture.)
In February 2016 I was part of the faculty at the San Miguel Writers Conference (San Miguel de Allende, Mexico), and led the creative writing workshop at the Knowlton Literary Festival in Knowlton, Quebec in October.
In 2017, I returned to Mount Allison University to indulge myself in two years of full time study of eco-poetry, feminist philosophy, sustainability in education and medieval studies. Thanks to MTA, in the summer of 2017 I completed a residency to research and create a one-act spoken-word play entitled, “Bearing Witness”.
During my tenure as 2018 Writer-in-Residence at Joggins Fossil Institute, I researched and wrote — “Daring to Hope at the Cliff’s Edge: Pangea’s Dream Remembered”: an art/science collaboration and conversation between myself and the three-hundred million year old rock. The theme: how to find what Buddhist eco-philosopher, Joanna Macy calls Active Hope as we stand at this cliff’s edge in our evolution as a species. The book was launched in Sackville, N.B. on Sept. 29, 2019 by Chapel Street Editions.
Due to covid, my cross country tour to promote this book was cancelled, but late 2020 saw a resurgence of interest in the work and its message of hope. I participated in the Writing for Change series launched by The Rose Theater in Brampton, ON. An exciting variation on this theme will be happening virtually on March 21 at The Rose with spoken-word artist extraordinaire, Ian Keteku.
Click here for Elizabeth's website
Glenn
Born in Philadelphia in 1944, Glenn (as he likes to be called) grew up in a house where his father practiced piano for 5 hours a night, making Bach, Chopin and Mozart his ‘cradle music’. He moved to Montreal in 1961 to study classical voice at McGill University. Faced with challenges relating to his race, gender and sexual orientation, he dropped out of university before completing his degree, picked up a guitar and started writing music.
In 1970 Glenn-Copeland recorded two albums. The first, part of CBC’s ‘Transcription Series,’ was titled Beverly Copeland: a virtuosic showcase of classical and jazz vocal stylings, poetry, jazz and folk, accompanied by some of the best players of the time. Original pressings of that album now fetch thousands of dollars. Six months later Glenn- Copeland made a studio album with many of those same musicians, including the brilliant Lenny Breau, titled Beverly Glenn-Copeland.
It wasn’t until 1986 that Glenn-Copeland recorded again. Inspired by a profound relationship with nature, an obsession with science fiction and some of the earliest drum-machines and synthesisers, Keyboard Fantasies was born. Self-released on cassette, it sold less than 100 copies.
In the early 1990’s Beverly Glenn-Copeland first heard the term ‘transgender’. Armed with the language to describe the way he had felt all his life, he discovered a self-identity which had previously eluded him.
In 2016, Keyboard Fantasies was discovered by a revered Japanese record-store owner. Word spread and several re-issues were released. One thing led to another, and within a year, with his new band, Indigo Rising, he began to tour the world.
In the summer of 2023, Glenn released an album of brand-new music called The Ones Ahead, another high-point in a career that has defied categorisation that toured Montreal, New York City and upstate New York in the fall of 2024. Glenn’s love for working with children and youth has been a constant throughout his life. He appeared as regular guest ‘Beverly’ on the beloved Canadian children’s TV show Mr. Dress-up for nearly 30 years. He wrote for Sesame Street and Shining Times Station. With his wife, Elizabeth, a theatre artist, poet and artist educator, he has completed more than a dozen artist residencies in schools and community settings in N.B. and Ontario. They founded and ran a theatre school, KPH Theatre Productions during their years in Miramichi, N.B. and together they have written four musical plays that speak to the issues of our times.
Glenn lives in Hamilton, Ontario with his wife, Elizabeth.
