Leonard Cohen dies aged 82

Canadian singer Leonard Cohen has died aged 82…

The following announcement was made on Cohen’s facebook page:

“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.”

The songwriter, poet and author had only just released his 14th studio album You Want It Darker and in fact the vinyl edition of that record is still not out at the time of writing.

Cohen is probably best know for his songs Suzanne and So Long Marianne, although in later years Hallelujah (originally from 1984’s Various Positions) has become a modern classic, and achieved unlikely primetime recognition when it was chosen as the ‘winner’s song’ in the 2008 series of X-Factor.

A poet to the end, in a letter to his muse, Marianne Ihlen, who died in Norway in July this year, Cohen wrote “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”.

Rest in Peace. Leonard Cohen 1934-2016.