BC songbird Beverley McKeen combines insightfully emotional lyrics about subjects spanning the environment and sodality to heartbreak and haywire relationships.
McKeen’s muse graces her two pop/folk/roots CDs On Purpose, and Poetic Wax. Her genre style is varied and a feature of these albums of Beverley's songs.
Socially outspoken McKeen is often heard with many polished players during a raft of coastal gigs. Her two CDs feature a stellar group of veteran and exciting young musicians from across Canada.
Beverley McKeen is a published poet, as part of the American Poetry Anthology, 1989. She began writing and singing her own songs at 17 when McKeen bought her first guitar for $25.
Having studied Royal Conservatory of Music for 8 years, she already had a strong foundation for musical composition. Beverley's classical training often comes through in the complexity and unpredictability of her melody structures. Superbly catchy lyrics and chord patterns are a hallmark of Beverley McKeen's songwriting.
McKeen says music is in her bones and her genes. Born on the Canadian east coast, McKeen says some of that musical influence weaves its way through her music. Beverley says she was encouraged by all her family members, but specifically by a late Uncle, Graham McKeen of Montreal, a jazz boulevardier who played Greenich Village coffeehouses and hung out with Kerouac, Ginsberg and Mailer. He told her she would meet the coolest people playing music. McKeen says her Uncle was right, and she inherited a hint of jazz flavouring in a few of her songs, from him. Having lived more than half of her life on the west coast, she says she has developed her own style / genre, difficult to pin down into any one category, but very listenable and enjoyable. With a sweet voice, steady and often described as proficient hand on the guitar, Beverley McKeen delivers her music and audiences receive it gratefully. McKeen has opened for Willie P. Bennett, Luther Wright and the Wrongs, and The Mahones.
Many venues of all sizes under her belt, Beverley McKeen has been playing music festivals, corporate events, picnics, weddings, farmer's markets, pubs, political events, Chritmas kick-offs, birthdays, and just about any kind of gig where music fits the bill, all year round. McKeen has also organized or assisted with mjusical benefits for people and world events like Heart of the Matter and Tsunami Aid , and CBC's Groove for Food Challenge.
Having been retained to write for theme many times, specific songwriting is Beverley McKeen's forte'. She has co-written a song about the inclusion of all peoples for CUPE (Canadian Union of Public Employees), and has penned a work about the threatened closure of a community beloved senior citizens residence, Cowichan Lodge, on Vancouver Island. Beverley McKeen cares about her world and beyond her musical bones, that fuels the muse she says.
With the release of Poetic Wax, her sophomore album, Beverley McKeen has already begun recording her third project with Producer,/bass veteran Martyn Jones.
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