NEWS: See Leonard Streaming Live

Leonard Cohen is being honored by the Grammys with a Lifetime Achievement Award this evening in a special reception. Here's the schedule. The times are Pacific time.

3 p.m.: Special Merit Awards Ceremony — red carpet and ceremony

5 p.m.: Special Merit Awards Ceremony — reception

There is a live stream too so we can watch everything:

http://www.grammy.com/live

Thanks to sue7 for the links.

Watch and share this very special moment with Leonard.

YOUTUBES: Leonard at Canadian Consul General's Residence n LA

UPDATE:
Listen to the full audio version of Leonard's speech on CBC Radio from Marie Bartlett's blog. Thanks to Mollydog for the point.
-----

Thanks to mariejoelleparent for uploading and Florian for pointing:

NEWS: Cohen has now taught us that sometimes the good guys do win.

Joshua Ostroff of Spinner has written an absolutely wonderful biographic piece on Leonard and his upcoming Grammy award.

Leonard Cohen: He's Grammy's Man

Some artists, like the Rolling Stones back in 1986, get their Grammy lifetime achievement recognition too early; others come, as with Michael Jackson this year, sadly too late. But 75-year-old Leonard Cohen has, as always, impeccable timing.

Cohen's Grammy 2010 Lifetime Achievement Award arrives at the height of the iconic septuagenarian's umpteenth comeback. A wildly acclaimed two-years-and-counting world tour has seen Cohen storm the gates of popular culture as crowds clamoured for sold-out tickets and artists increasingly name-dropped his influence.

Right this moment, the top iTunes download is Justin Timberlake's cover of Cohen's 'Hallelujah,' which the pop star performed with Matt Morris at the recent Hope for Haiti telethon, quietly using Cohen's songcraft to outshine a superstar collaboration between U2, Rihanna and Jay-Z.

The article goes on to trace Leonard's story ending on this note:

When he accepts his Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award on Sunday, we should remember that the lesson of Leonard Cohen -- a man whom Angelica Huston once aptly described as "part wolf, part angel" -- is ultimately the opposite of his bleak 'Everybody Knows' worldview. Even if the fight is fixed, the poor stay poor and the rich get rich, Cohen has now taught us that sometimes the good guys do win.

NEWS: Leonard at Canadian Consul General in LA to celebrate upcoming Grammy

From The Canadian Press, January 28, 2010

Leonard Cohen pays respect to Canada at consulate showcase in L.A.
By Nick Patch (CP)

LOS ANGELES — With the Grammy Awards about to honour Leonard Cohen, the 75-year-old Montreal legend decided to pay respect to his home country during a party at the Canadian consul general's residence on Thursday.

Cohen, clad in a dark suit with his trademark fedora shading his eyes, climbed onstage alongside a group of other artists at the gathering - held annually in honour of Canadian Grammy nominees - before making a brief speech to the cheers of a grateful crowd.

"My great grandfather, Lazarus Cohen, came to Canada in 1869, to the county of Glengarry, a little town in Maberly," Cohen said.

"It's customary to thank people for the help and aid they've given. On this occasion, because of the great hospitality that was accorded my ancestor who came here over 140 years ago, I want to thank this country, Canada, for allowing us to live and work and flourish in a place that was different from all other places in the world.

"So I thank Canada for the opportunity that was given me to work and play and flourish. ... Thank you, friends."

While Cohen made only a brief appearance at the party, his presence carried weight with the other attendees.

"It's nice to be up there with an icon," said Steve Wood of Alberta powwow dance group Northern Cree, nominated for a fifth time for best native American album, who stood next to Cohen onstage.

Cohen will be honoured on Saturday with a lifetime achievement award from the Recording Academy, which puts on the Grammys.

The celebrated musician and poet, oddly, has only ever won one Grammy and it wasn't for one of his own albums. He earned a trophy for contributing vocals to Herbie Hancock's "River: The Joni Letters," which won album of the year in 2008.

The group of Canadian Grammy hopefuls who attended the poolside party on Thursday could then potentially match Cohen's tally at Sunday's 51st Grammy Awards (Global, 8 p.m. ET).

They Were Wrong

I finally upgraded the search engine on Speaking Cohen (the labeling feature is still under construction). I was testing it out today but didn't get very far because one of the first pages I came to was the list of articles first announcing Leonard Cohen's 2008 World Tour. Back then there was speculation about what to expect and there were doubts about the voice, the energy, and the abilities of our poet. Now, two years later we know better than to doubt. Never doubt the extraordinariness of Leonard Cohen and his work.

Wilfred Langmaid wrote about it best in the Daily Gleaner after witnessing that very first concert of the tour:

It was the most unlikely of scenarios.

Sony BMG artist Leonard Cohen had not been on tour in a decade-and-a-half, and he is almost 74. He announced a world tour in March, and that got worldwide attention. News that the tour would begin in small venues - and that the first stop would be Fredericton - was a minor miracle. The show sold out in minutes.

Most people expected quite a few hiccups on opening night. Many people expected a relatively short show, all things considered. Some people thought that the show would be rather weak, but it would still be a chance to see a legend.

These people were all wrong.

YOUTUBES: The Window

Continuing our efforts to highlight Leonard Cohen songs he did not include in the 2008-2009 World Tour, we present The Window. Once again, we have kaarekjohnsen to thank for this upload from the 1979 Rock-Pop Special filmed in Munich, West Germany. An absolutely beautiful song and a testament to how lyric and music work together to produce the emotion.

NEWS ROUNDUP: Hallelujah No.1 Again and Another Isle of Wight Review

Leonard Cohen's song Hallelujah is No. 1 on the iTunes single charts. Justin Timberlake and Matt Morris performed the song on the Hope for Haiti Now telethon on Friday. Now Rolling Stone reports today:

While the song “Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour),” performed by Jay-Z, U2 and Rihanna, was the big story heading into “Hope For Haiti Now,” the performance that has drawn the most charity downloads on iTunes internationally has been Justin Timberlake and Matt Morris’ duet on Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” In fact, as of press time, JT’s “Hallelujah” continues to top U.S. iTunes Top Singles chart, beating out Taylor Swift’s “Today Was a Fairytale”; it’s also the lone “Hope For Haiti Now” performance on the iTunes Top 10 songs chart.

And the UK's Westmorland Gazette provides a lovely review of Isle of Wight but not without looking "back" first:

...at the age of seventy-four, Cohen has gained himself a whole new audience, spanning every demographic, with his magnificent, truly uplifting shows that have been universally acclaimed, by both critics and fans alike, as amongst the very finest seen. The doubters have finally been won over, realising that Cohen’s music, especially when performed ‘live’, is in fact anything but a miserable experience and indeed, many thousands have left his shows on an exhilarating ‘high’. A Leonard Cohen concert is now just about the ‘hottest’ ticket around with the singer capable of selling out vast arenas in minutes, having now, in the twilight of his career, achieved genuine mass appeal...

And on to the review of Isle of Wight:

Not only will this incredible CD & DVD package appeal to Cohen’s new, younger fans who will now get to witness for the first time this early career tour de force performance, it will also thrill all those who have been with him since the beginning and experienced this moment in Isle Of Wight history for themselves. And ‘Leonard Cohen Live At The Isle Of Wight 1970’ is a perfect reminder of why Cohen is still one of the most relevant and respected artists today.

Thank you, Anthony Loman, for this great review.

MAJOR COOLNESS: Dino Soldo's Gravity

Wow, check out Dino's animated video for the first single, Gravity, off his new album, Hotel Suites.

NEWS ROUNDUP: Another Review of Isle of Wight

Film Journal International reviewed Leonard Cohen's Isle of Wight CD/DVD. Their headline pays the work the highest praise: "Though the year has just started, Leonard Cohen Live at the Isle of Wight 1970 may well turn out to be one of the best films of 2010."

The reviewer goes on and proves not to be a big fan of Dylan:

It is hard not to compare the Leonard Cohen of 1970 to his contemporary, Bob Dylan, both in term of their curly-haired appearance and stripped-down style of storytelling. But it is the lesser-known Cohen who comes off as the more authentic, beginning with his Jewish heritage. (Cohen kept his birth name while Dylan changed his from Robert Allen Zimmerman.) More significantly, there’s the music: Cohen’s songs are far less catchy but considerably more moving (and frankly more pleasing to the ear). The highlights of this particular concert are the two beautifully painful tributes to women, “Suzanne” and “Seems So Long Ago, Nancy” (about a suicide victim). Yet, in his own more personal way, Cohen remains just as politically valid as Dylan minus the pretensions. Even Cohen’s patter between songs (“They’ve surrounded the island”) reveals a wicked, deadpan sense of humor missing from the more earnest Dylan.

Read the rest of the review here.