Local Artists Sing Cohen's Praises (Sydney Morning Herald)

[sturgess66]

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/mus ... 17rre.html

Local Artists Sing Cohen's Praises
John Mangan
November 14, 2010


Leonard Cohen: Never in fashion, never out of fashion.
Photo: John Woudstra

Unlike today's pop stars, Leonard Cohen has always been the real deal. Which is why he's still drawing crowds.

WHEN the Melbourne Festival closed last month with a Sidney Myer Music Bowl concert featuring Sinead O'Connor, John Cale, Rickie Lee Jones and others paying tribute to Leonard Cohen, it was no passing fancy on the part of festival director Brett Sheehy.

While Cohen has never had a hit single himself, the soulful, often melancholy songs the 76-year-old Canadian has been releasing since 1967 have engraved themselves in contemporary music's lexicon: Suzanne, Bird on the Wire, Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye and, of course, Hallelujah.

That song, famously covered by the likes of k.d. lang and the late Jeff Buckley, has taken on a life of its own, with Buckley's 1994 recording heading the iTunes download chart in early 2008 after a contestant in American Idol performed it. That Christmas the UK X Factor winner, Alexandra Burke, topped the British charts with a version of the song while Buckley's version was No. 2. Cohen's original version was No. 36.
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Last year Cohen made a triumphant concert return to Australia, so triumphant that this weekend, a good 54 years after his first collection of poetry was published at McGill University in Montreal, he's back, playing two gigs at the Rod Laver Arena. Next Saturday more than 12,000 fans will see him in a soldout show at Hanging Rock.

''I've had a long personal journey with Cohen,'' says Sheehy, who discovered the singer-songwriter in the 1970s through a collection of his poetry, The Energy of Slaves.

Miss Blair in Year 11 allowed Sheehy to write about the Quebecois while all his classmates were doing Shelley, Wordsworth and Keats. The future Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide festival director was hooked, and Cohen has kept popping up in Sheehy's programs: his 2008 Adelaide Festival included Book of Longing, a collaboration between Cohen and Philip Glass; his last Sydney Festival in 2005 featured Came So Far For Beauty, a tribute to Cohen at the Opera House starring Nick Cave, Jarvis Cocker, Beth Orton and others.

Paul Cashmere, founder of Australian music website Undercover.fm, says Cohen transcends time and place.

''In the music biz we see the overnight sensations, the one-hit wonders and the superstars all the time. Leonard Cohen was never any of those. He has never been in fashion, so therefore he will never be out of fashion. He has never been a music industry 'product'. People connect with him because he's real,'' Cashmere says.

At the recent Myer Music Bowl concert Dan Sultan took his microphone into the crowd for a stirring performance of Cohen's If it Be Your Will. When he supports the singer at Hanging Rock next Saturday he expects an emotional night.

''To start with [there'll be] humility and a lot of excitement, and a lot of nerves. We just want to make sure we can put on a good show,'' he says.

Clare Bowditch, who has been supporting Cohen's Rod Laver Arena concerts, explains why the legend's songs are so enduring.

''Because he puts so much love into it, because he wrote these songs as though he were tending to his prize roses, because of his heart, and the fact that he wasn't afraid to be sexy and broken his whole life,'' she says. ''He is a master storyteller, and in the end that is an incredible and rare thing to be.''

Cashmere concurs. ''A hundred years from now people will still be listening to Leonard Cohen,'' he says. ''I doubt they'll be listening to Lady Gaga.''

[MaryB]

"Sexy and broken his whole life." What a combination. Thanks yet again Linda!

[oblivion]

mary , that´s incredible!! just in this very moment i wanted to write exactly the same! sexy and broken...

[MaryB]

Ute, LC fans always seem to be on the same page

[oblivion]

great

[annmarie]

Whah?????????????? He was never in fashion?????????? He was very much in fashion in certain circles since the late 60s, still is, if not more so!
"Sexy and broken his whole life", again whah?? Sexy for sure but broken is not a word I would associate with the man. Perhaps, open, vulnerable, honest, genuine..........lots of adjectives one could use but not "broken".
Oh dear, I guess I'm just a fan!
Anne