Iconic singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen has died at the age of 82.
The sad news of the Grammy-winning musician’s passing from undisclosed causes was announced on his Facebook page early on Friday morning (November 10).
A statement from Sony Music Canada read: “It is with profound sorrow we report that legendary poet, songwriter and artist, Leonard Cohen has passed away.
“We have lost one of music’s most revered and prolific visionaries. A memorial will take place in Los Angeles at a later date. The family requests privacy during their time of grief.”
Along with Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, Cohen’s confessional songwriting set the tone for the singer-songwriter movement of the early and mid-1970s.
Cohen actually started out as a novelist, but turned to the budding folk music scene in the late 1960s when he failed to make a living with his writing in spite of wide critical acclaim.
Highlights of his early work included the country-tinged ‘Bird on the Wire’, which has been covered throughout the decades by the likes of Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson and Joe Cocker.
Arguably his most commercially successful track was 1984’s spiritually-tinged ‘Hallelujah’, which reached an entirely new generation a decade later when it was re-imagined by the late Jeff Buckley.
Through the years, Cohen has been honoured with induction in the Rock and Roll and Canadian Music Halls of Fame and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 – among many other prestigious music prizes.
Cohen’s 14th student album You Want It Darker was only released in October, and received some of the best reviews of his later career.
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