Musician and transgender activist Beverly Glenn-Copeland released his new age/folk/ambient masterpiece Keyboard Fantasies in 1986, made entirely with Yamaha DX-7 and a Roland TR-707 keyboards and self-released on cassette. A cult album that has continued to grow in its influence over the years, Keyboard Fantasies is now getting a new 35th anniversary reissue that will be out April 9 via Transgressive. This new edition features liner notes by Robyn, and artwork that is more faithful to the original cassette than other reissues. It also marks the first time it will be available on CD.
"Not all, but the best artists are like tourist guides waiting at the brink of an emotional landscape, waving their flag, greeting the arriving visitors to their new destination," Robyn writes in her liner notes. "'Welcome to Sadness, let me show you around!' Not all artists are aware of the task, but some are nice enough to take this less glamorous part of the job seriously. Beverly Glenn-Copeland is one of the best at it. As an adventurer and a rebel he tread uncharted territory for years, getting to know the terrain so that others could follow and visit what he had already explored. I was one of those people who discovered Keyboard Fantasies many years after it was made, but it felt new and like it was made for this time. Glenn sang to me as I was lying down on the floor of a rehearsal studio: 'Let it go, let it go down, it’s ok.'"
Pre-orders, including a cassette version, are available now. Included with early pre-orders is a flexi-disc featuring an unreleased live recording of “Old Melody” from 1975.
Along with the announcement, he's shared a new live video of "Let Us Dance" directed by Posy Dixon. "I am profoundly grateful to all who have supported the music of Keyboard Fantasies during these last years, with special appreciation to my wife Elizabeth,” says Glenn. "Though written over thirty years ago, I have listened to your recent musings about the hope the music inspires and the calm it brings, finally understanding that the transmissions sent through me from what I call the Universal Broadcasting System are helping to accomplish the UBS’s purpose, namely that of bringing us together as a single human family at last. For this I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. Blessings." Watch that, and read Robyn's full liner notes, below.
In 2019 Glenn played his first-ever live shows in the U.S. -- he was born in Philadelphia but moved to Canada in the early-'60s -- surrounding the release of documentary Keyboard Fantasies: The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story. Last year, Beverly Glenn-Copeland released Transmissions: The Music (which made our Best of 2020 list and you can buy in our new store), a retrospective that also included new and archival unreleased tracks, as well as live versions of Keyboard Fantasies songs. You can listen to that below.
Keyboard Fantasies tracklist A. Ever New Winter Astral Let Us Dance
B. Slow Dance Old Melody Sunset Village
Keyboard Fantasies Liner Notes: By Robyn
Not all, but the best artists are like tourist guides waiting at the brink of an emotional landscape, waving their flag, greeting the arriving visitors to their new destination. “Welcome to Sadness, let me show you around!”
Not all artists are aware of the task, but some are nice enough to take this less glamorous part of the job seriously. Beverly Glenn-Copeland is one of the best at it. As an adventurer and a rebel he tread uncharted territory for years, getting to know the terrain so that others could follow and visit what he had already explored. I was one of those people who discovered Keyboard Fantasies many years after it was made, but it felt new and like it was made for this time. Glenn sang to me as I was lying down on the floor of a rehearsal studio: “Let it go, let it go down, it’s ok.” And I could hear that the voice knew what it was talking about, it pierced my heart and still gave me space to feel my own feelings. Glenn does this, he shows you the way with his voice, his polyrhythmic arrangements and the empty spaces in between, through his own experiences, but always with so much care for the one who listens. It’s even spelled out in the lyrics.
He seems even more focused on the healing and teacher aspects of his artistry now, but it is on Keyboard Fantasies that this purpose seems to crystallise.
Sometimes I think about Glenn and I imagine the moment after he finished the song, ‘Sunset Village’. I imagine him maybe listening back alone in his house in Ontario in the snow. I think about that this music existed such a long time before it became more widely known. That it was there in his mind and in his house long before I heard it and long before it was rediscovered by people all over the world. It does something strange, it makes me a discoverer together with Glenn every time I listen. And Glenn is like: “watch your head when you enter the cave; the ceiling is lower than one might think.” - Robyn
