As if Tuesday’s election result wasn’t enough to knock out poets, artists, activists, and other sentient beings, Thursday’s announcement that singer-songwriter and poet Leonard Cohen, 82, had died earlier in the week was simply too much bad news in an already unprecedented year of loss. Not only will Cohen obviously be missed by fans and fellow artists who relied on his wisdom, but women have rarely known an artist of Cohen’s generation who loved, admired, honored, respected, and employed them in the studio and on the road as consistently as he did.
The women in Cohen’s life were not simply ornaments, adjuncts, or names in song titles: Marianne, and Suzanne were famously real people as was Joan of Arc. But Cohen who notoriously loved the company of women, was also an advocate for working women artists and paid them (we hope equally as their male counterparts) to write with him, produce and engineer his records, and sing on the road. Even in the so-called liberal, open-minded and progressive music business, there are relatively few working female producers and engineers and too few top name recording artists who employ them. But Cohen consistently placed female collaborators in the highest levels of operation. That he should be such a hit with us is no surprise. Elevating women in song and verse is one thing but having the knowledge and humility to take our value into the workplace added a layer and depth to his own art. His actions are pretty much unprecedented in the male-dominated music business, unless I’m missing something: Jennifer Warnes, Sharon Robinson, Leanne Ungar, Perla Battala, Anjani Thomas, Julie Christensen and Rebecca De Mornay were among his most frequent collaborators; I’ve missed some, but you get the idea. Cohen’s biographer was Sylvie Simmons and Lian Lunson directed the 2005 concert film, I’m Your Man.
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Filed under: Arts and Culture, new article, Leonard Cohen, Obituary, Poetry
Denise Sullivan 