Leonard Norman Cohen, CC, GOQ (born September 21, 1934 in Westmount, Montreal) is a Canadian singer, songwriter, musician, poet and novelist. Cohen published his first book of poetry in Montreal in 1956 and his first novel in 1963. His work often deals with the exploration of religion, isolation, sexuality and complex interpersonal relationships.
Cohen's earliest songs (many of which appeared on the 1967 album, Songs of Leonard Cohen) were rooted in European folk music. In the 1970s, his music encompassed pop, cabaret and world music. Since the 1980s his high baritone voice has evolved into lower registers (bass baritone and bass), with accompaniment from electronic synthesizers and female backing singers.
Over one thousand renditions of Cohen's songs have been recorded. He has been inducted into both the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and is also a Companion of the Order of Canada, the nation's highest civilian honour. While giving the speech at his induction into the American Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 10, 2008, Lou Reed described Cohen as in the "highest and most influential echelon of songwriters.
Biography
Early life
Music 1960s and 1970s
Cohen was born in 1934 in Montreal, Quebec, into a middle-class Jewish family. His father was of Polish ancestry. His mother, of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry, immigrated from Lithuania. He grew up in Westmount on the Island of Montreal. His father, Nathan Cohen, owned a substantial Montreal clothing store, and died when Leonard was nine years old. Like many other Jewish families with names like Cohen, Katz, and Kagan, Cohen's family claimed descent from the Kohanim: "I had a very Messianic childhood," he told Richard Goldstein in 1967. "I was told I was a descendant of Aaron, the high priest.
He attended Herzliah High School, where he studied with poet Irving Layton. As a teenager he learned to play the guitar, subsequently forming a country-folk group called the Buckskin Boys. His father's will provided Leonard with a modest trust income, sufficient to allow him to pursue his literary ambitions.
Development as a poet
In 1951, Cohen enrolled at McGill University, where he became president of the McGill Debating Union. Literary influences during this time included Yeats, Whitman and Henry Miller. His first published book of poetry, Let Us Compare Mythologies (1956), was published under Louis Dudek as the first book in the McGill Poetry Series while Cohen was still an undergraduate student. The Spice-Box of Earth (1961) made him well known in poetry circles, especially in his native Canada.
After completing an undergraduate degree, Cohen spent a term in McGill's law school and a year (1956-7) at Columbia University.
Cohen applied a strong work ethic to his early and keen literary ambitions. He wrote poetry and fiction through much of the 1960s, and preferred to live in quasi-reclusive circumstances. After moving to Hydra, a Greek island, Cohen published the poetry collection Flowers for Hitler (1964), and the novels The Favourite Game (1963) and Beautiful Losers (1966). The Favourite Game is an autobiographical bildungsroman about a young man who discovers his identity through writing.
Leonard Cohen Download Full Discography (12 albums)
DearHeather/ October 26 2004
Ten New Songs/October 9 2001
The Future/November 24 1992
I'm Your Man/February 1988
Various Positions/December 1984
Recent Songs/September 1979
Death of a Ladies' Man/November 1977
New Skin for the Old Ceremony/August 1974
Live Songs/1971
Songs of Love and Hate/March 1971 Part.2
Songs of Love and Hate/March 1971 Part.1
Songs from a Room/April 1969
Songs of Leonard Cohen/December 27 1967
Music-Face™ Enjoy The Music..
