leonardcohenforum.com

These are some places in Manhattan that have a Cohen connection. They may not be the best tourist sites, but many Cohen fans seem to have enjoyed seeing them. Since the February 2009 concert is at the Beacon Theater, I decided to order this list roughly from Uptown (north Manhattan) to Downtown (south Manhattan).

Columbia University (126th and Broadway) and International House (500 Riverside Drive, north of Riverside Church near 122nd street). Cohen took graduate courses at Columbia, and met and wooed Anne while living in the International House. Locations were used by Cohen fans for the New York 2004 Cohen Event.

92nd Street Y (Lexington Ave and 92nd St – East Side). Leonard read poetry and spoke here. 1966 recorded.

Beacon (Broadway, 74th and 75th) – Also performed here in November 1988.

Lincoln Center (65th and Amsterdam) – Performed in Avery Fisher Hall, February 1975.

Plaza Hotel (Central Park South, 59th and 5 Ave). Attended Scientology meetings here and met Suzanne, Adam and Lorca’s mother, on elevator.

Carnegie Hall (57th and 7thAve). Venue for May 1985 and June 1988 concerts.

Columbia Records (old location is at 51 W 52nd)

St Patrick’s Cathedral (50th St and 5th Ave). Statue of Kateri Tekakwitha on front entrance door.

Town Hall (43rd between Broadway and 6th Ave). Anti war concert, S.A.N.E., with Judy Collins. 1967

Madison Square Garden (7th Ave and 34th). Played the Paramount Theater in June of 1993; theater venue is now renamed WaMu Theater.

Chelsea Hotel (23rd between 7th and 8th Ave). Cohen residence on several occasions and the location of Janis’s room and a famed elevator.

Greenwich Village. Always worth a stroll down W. 4th, MacDougal and Bleeker streets, although Bottom Line and many other landmarks are now gone.

Slipper Room (127 Orchard St – at Stanton). Burlesque Lounge where Cohen and U2 filmed Tower of Song for I’m Your Man movie.

Stanton Street (179). Lived here with Marianne and Axel and described “music on Clinton Street” in Famous Blue Raincoat.

Museum of Jewish Heritage (36 Battery Place). Top floor features a performer video exhibit that includes Cohen. Although the location is far downtown, it is close to Battery Park, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Staten Island ferry, Wall Street, Federal Hall, Trinity and St Paul Churches, the World Financial Center and Ground Zero.

Will make an additional post here with some non-Cohen NYC suggestions for visitors.

Hi Dick,

Thank you SO much for all the suggestions! You have gone to an incredible amount of work to list so many places of interest to those who may be visiting NY for the first time. Actually, some of your suggestions are great even for those of us who have been to the city dozens of times! I was in the Chelsea Hotel for the first time in December and loved it, but still after lots of visits have never really seen and felt the Village. Perhaps this time. Once again, your research is awesome. Ever thought about writing a tour book?!

Diana

The Village exists in the past-- in the memory and in the poetry of those who were there when it was:

Greenwich Villlage of my Dreams pt. 1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vU0ZBkte8J8

Greenwich Village of my Dreams pt. 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLTCyVsLYKk

Hi Thelma,

How wonderful to listen to Tuli. Thank you so very much for sharing this with us (and me). I was quite impressed at the end as I believe you filmed the video! Is this correct? How fascinating to connect with those from a different age. Although I haven't been to the Village you are so correct that it truly no longer exists except in the realm of history and mystique. The draw to see it may still be there but what existed in the 50's and 60's is long gone. You see that also in the South Beach area of San Francisco. The streets, apartments, bookstores and bars may still exist but the giant personalities that brought it life do not. That is why videos like yours help us to touch that era if only for a moment in the memories of an aging poet/author icon.

Thanks again,
Diana

Yes, I did film the video. Tuli is personal friend. I was a teenybopper in the Village during the early '60s but not old enough to witness the '50s. I would cut high school and hang out in Washington Square Park, read the Village Voice and meet beatnik dope dealers trying to sell me bennies (speed). I went to coffee houses, heard folk music at Gerdes Folk City where Dylan and others debuted , went to theatre at the Circle in the Square. I remember it as a magic place,a great escape --escape from the tedium of "normalcy" which I was never suited for (high school, parents, the suburbs). When a math teacher asked me why I was absent, I told him it was Atheists' Christmas. The Village was for me.

P.S. Tuli is 85 and loves YouTube and the Internet. His channel is called "tulifuli."

Thanks much lightning -- Great stuff!

Another Cohen site I omitted ... would be Jazz at lincon Ceneter in the Time-Warner towers at Columbus Cicrle --- 59th and 8th Ave

Book of Longing shows held there.

Hi Dick,

Thanks again for yet another site! Many of us will only be there for one night so will have to stash these ideas in a memory bank for a later visit.

Lightning,

Thank you for sharing your personal story! On a MUCH smaller scale I too experienced sort of that same feeling in Toronto in the early 60's. Hippies did not yet exist and Yorkville was several years away from the boutiques and discos that followed. However, the narrow streets were home to a couple of dark, smoky coffehouses with poetry, chess, folk music and intense discussions which to me were a world away from my suburban high school. New York and San Francisco though were the places to be.

ladydi wrote: On a MUCH smaller scale I too experienced sort of that same feeling in Toronto in the early 60's. Hippies did not yet exist and Yorkville was several years away from the boutiques and discos that followed. However, the narrow streets were home to a couple of dark, smoky coffehouses with poetry, chess, folk music and intense discussions which to me were a world away from my suburban high school. New York and San Francisco though were the places to be.

Diana - That paragraph is something that my wife Eve could have written! She too would head to Yorkville in the 60's to escape her suburban life. The world is getting smaller and smaller. We'll see you in a few days,

Mike

Hi Mike,

Six degrees of separation... Isn't it amazing. Looking forward to meeting you and Eve!

Diana

Dick,

Thanks for posting this comprehensive list of Cohen sites in NYC.
It's much more inclusive than my New York Walking Tour, from the 2004 New York Event, but we only had 2 hours before the Treasure Hunt.

evelyn

Makes me nostalgic, as much for what I missed as for what I saw. Grew up in the San Francisco Sunset District; used to visit North Beach occassionally in the fifties and early sixties, visited the Coffee Confusion in the '50s; the Avalon and the Family dog in the '60s; the Village once in '68; loved the free concerts in the panhandle and GG Park. Through all that, hardly knew what I was looking for; didn't know it when I saw it. Just a typical straight white jewish kid who suspected but didn't quite get that he was living at the center of the universe. But I listened to the music. Discovered Leonard in '68 while living in Israel. Along with Leonard's music, the music of the '60s and early '70s will never be outdone.

Hi Ron,

How interesting that some of us seem to gravitate back to that era...the 60's and 70's. It's not like our parents with the 30's and 40's, but I guess in some ways it may be similar. It was a defining age. I doubt that any young person today in their late teens or early twenties has that same inner connection to a cause. Well, having said that I know there are many young people involved in causes, but it's not the same overwhelming sense of thousands coming together for the same thing. Whether it was the beat generation....the summer of love....the opposition to the Vietnam war...the rebellion against all the traditionlists stood for.....the freedom to simply be. The music and the poetry of the age spoke to us. We were one.

The music itself was some of the finest expressions of love, peace, revolt.....and simply pure beating, pulsing sound!

I had a Jewish friend who took off for Israel in '67 and lived there for a couple of years. She HAD to go. She HAD to be there for her country, even though she was born in Canada. Many moments in those years were so intense, but I also think that when the intensity is there, so is the art....the music, the writings, the poetry.

Many of us who passed through those years may have only touched the issues lightly...perhaps missed them altogether, or been involved in them totally. But whatever, the years do evoke nostalgia.

Warm remembrances on a Valentine's night....

Hi Ron, I was born in San francisco but grew up in San mateo and and graduated from San Mateo high in 1967. San mateo High school is also Kris Kristophperson's Alma Mater! I started coming up to S.F. 1967 and 1968 to go to the Haight and also to concerts. I'm sure like you i saw some pretty incredible shows. The first one i went to was Canned Heat at the Avalon Ball Room. What an eye opener that was! I remember once I went to the Family Dog out by the Beach to see the Jefferson Airplane and somebody broke into my MGB and stole my eight track tape player.
I also tend to think the music from the 60's and 70's (especially the early 70's) is the best. i first heard of leonard Cohen in 1969. i liked his music but didn't really connect to it until about a year and a half ago. I was feeling disillusioned with what was happening to our country so i would go on Youtube and look up artists from that time and listen to and watch their videos for nostalgic reasons. I had been aware of leonard on and off but not familiar with his newer stuff. i saw the video for Closing Time and was blown away. Shortly after I discovered the forum and as they say "the rest is history".
Do you still live in San Francisco? I moved away a time or two, but I always come back. i love it here and having lived in the area during the 60's I think makes it all the more special to me. It is hard to live anywhere else after that! Are you going to New York next week for the concert? If so hopefully we'll meet.

Frisco

Hi All ~

I was at the Gypsy Palace in Gainesville tonite, rooting around some clothing. I'd bought a used cd there a couple weeks ago [Sufis, northern Egypt], but its energy was too non-stop catharsis. A great recording had you been there and experienced it directly, as the cd would summon all of that back for you... but just for listening, it wasn't getting it for me. I kept looking at this, that, and the other, as he'd said I could trade it back for something else. Nothing was striking me quite right. He suggested I look at the couple stacks of classic R&R he'd just gotten. I didn't really want to, but after a couple times of his suggesting and then telling me to at least look, I did. Nothing was doing it for me until the very bottom one of the second stack and it was "Lennon / Legend" ~ done deal. These reminiscences reminded me of how quickly I was satisfied when I came upon it. So much HOPE in those times.

You're right in your descriptions, Diane. That really was how it was... at least for me, personally, and as a whole, generally.


~ Lizzy

Hi all

Stated earlier I would post some non-Cohen suggestions. Here is a top of the head list..... by no means complete! Hope everyone will have a wonderful time experiencing what I believe to be the greatest city in the world.

NYC Suggestions

Free things to do --- Central Park, NY Public Library (5th Ave and 42nd), Staten Island ferry ride (a bit over an hour round trip from Battery Park – exit when arrive in Staten Island and catch next boat back to Manhattan), City Hall, Brooklyn Bridge, Empire State Building, Rockefeller Center (shops, skating rink and plaza, NBC studios, Radio City Music Hall, etc.), Apple Store, Trump Plaza, Time Warner Building (shops, restaurants, Central Park views, Jazz museum, Samsung experience),Times Square and Theater District, Fifth Avenue shops.

NYC museums are generally all worthy of praise: Metropolitan, Guggenheim, Whitney, Frick, MOMA, Morgan Library, Jewish Museum, Museum of Natural History, etc.

Taxis are easy to hail almost anywhere, but they are more expensive than bus and subway transportation. Maps are available at most subway stations - $2.00 one way fare any distance, multi ride and weekly discounts available.

Broadway and off-Broadway performances are generally available in this economy and famous night clubs abound. No one has ever been able to eat in all the restaurants in almost any neighborhood.

Ring the bells.....