Legendary singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen has died at the age of 82, according to an official announcement on his Facebook page on Thursday night.
Though no further details were available, Cohen’s record label, Sony Music, confirmed his death.
A New York Times report quoted Cohen’s producer son, Adam saying, “My father passed away peacefully at his home in Los Angeles with the knowledge that he had completed what he felt was one of his greatest records. He was writing up until his last moments with his unique brand of humour.”
Interestingly, Cohen had predicted his death in a final love letter to his dying ex-girlfriend Marianne Ihlen earlier this year.
The Hallelujah star wrote to Marianne, who was in the final stages of leukaemia, that he thought he would ‘follow soon’ in the heartbreaking note written in July.
Cohen’s record label confirmed his death on Thursday, just months after he learned that his ex-love was dying through her friend Jan Christian Mollestad.
After learning of her condition, the Bird on a Wire singer wrote an ode to her. Mollestad recalled: “It took only two hours and in came this beautiful letter from Leonard to Marianne.”
He read Cohen’s letter to her before she died which Mollestad revealed on Canadian radio.
Mollestad said: “It said well Marianne it’s come to this time when we are really so old and our bodies are falling apart and I think I will follow you very soon. Know that I am so close behind you that if you stretch out your hand, I think you can reach mine.
“And you know that I’ve always loved you for your beauty and your wisdom, but I don’t need to say anything more about that because you know all about that.
“But now, I just want to wish you a very good journey. Goodbye old friend. Endless love, see you down the road.”
‘A memorial will take place in Los Angeles at a later date. The family requests privacy during their time of grief.’
He remained wildly popular into his 80s, when his deep voice plunged to seriously gravelly depths. He toured as recently as earlier this year and released a new album, You Want it Darker, just last month.
His debut album, Songs of Leonard Cohen, was released in December 1967, and while not everybody loved its funereal tone, the songs it contained, such as Suzanne, So Long, Marianne and Sisters of Mercy, would prove to be cornerstones of his repertoire for the rest of his long musical career.
In his later years he became a Zen monk and spent much of the 1990s sequestered in a monastery on Mount Baldy in California, where he was known as Jikan (the Silent One). Fans often seek spiritual guidance from their idols, but Cohen was a rare example of one who might actually have been capable of providing it.
Cohen was born in Westmount, a well-to-do suburb of Montreal. He was the second child of Nathan, who owned a clothing business, and his wife, Masha (nee Klonitsky), the daughter of a rabbi. Cohen exhibited a passion for country music from an early age and formed a country and western band, the Buckskin Boys, while studying English at McGill University.
At the time, this seemed like a mere sideline to a highly promising literary career. He published his first collection of poetry, Let Us Compare Mythologies, in 1956. His second, The Spice-Box of Earth, followed in 1961, and the provocatively titled Flowers for Hitler (1964) won him the Quebec literary award.
Moreover, Cohen, was as much a literary figure as a musical one. Early in his career, his novel Beautiful Losers (1966) caused the Boston Globe to declare that “James Joyce is not dead. He is living in Montreal under the name of Cohen.” Yet Cohen was determined to establish himself as a songwriter, having been smitten as profoundly as any of his contemporaries by the emergence of rock’n’roll music. “I always loved rock,” he said. “I remember the first time I heard Presley, how relieved and grateful I was that all this stuff he and all of us had been feeling for so long had finally found a particular kind of expression.”
Celebrities mourned his passing on social media, including Bette Midler and Russell Crowe.
‘Leonard Cohen has died. Another magical voice stilled,’ Midler wrote.
‘Leonard Cohen R.I.P. 2016 now officially one of the saddest years,’ Sean Lennon tweeted.
‘Dear Leonard Cohen, thanks for the quiet nights, the reflection, the perspective, the wry smiles and the truth #towerofsong,’ Crowe said.
‘This is heartbreaking. Can’t help but feel grateful for the tower of song he leaves behind,’ Hamilton star Lin-Manuel Miranda tweeted.
Achievements
2008 – Grammy Award for Album of the Year – River: The Joni Letters 2015 – Grammy Hall of Fame Award – Songs of Leonard Cohen 2015 – Juno Award for Album of the Year – Popular Problems.
Top 10 tracks
Nina Simone, “Suzanne” (1969)
Joe Cocker, “Bird on a Wire” (1969)
Roberta Flack, “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye” (1969)
Concrete Blonde, “Everybody Knows” (1990)
Jeff Buckley, “Hallelujah” (1994)
Tori Amos, “Famous Blue Raincoat” (1995)
R.E.M., “First We Take Manhattan” (1995)
Anohni, “If It Be Your Will” (2006)
Anna Calvi, “Joan of Arc” (2009)
Lana Del Rey, “Chelsea Hotel No. 2” (2013)
