The world according to Dan.

Rocker Leon Russell dies in Nashville

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Leon Russell, who performed, sang and produced some of rock ‘n’ roll’s top records, has died. He was 74.

Russell’s wife, Jan Bridges, said in a statement that her husband died in his sleep Sunday at their Nashville home. She said Russell had heart bypass surgery in July and had been planning on resuming touring in January.

His final performance was July 10 in Nashville.

Besides his music, Russell was known for his striking appearance: wispy white hair halfway down his back and that covered much of his face.

“A true patriarch has been lost,” said Beau Charron, Russell’s guitar and pedal steel player, said in a statement. “Leon Russell fathered many musicians and fans thru life and love with his music. On his own terms. My years with him have shaped me in profound ways, and I am heartbroken to lose my mentor and friend.”

Tributes poured in from entertainers who appreciated Russell’s gospel-infused southern boogie piano rock, blues and country music.

On Twitter, Cat Stevens wrote that Russell was “a great influence and songwriter.” Charlie Daniels said Russell “left a lot of great music behind.” And Richard Marx tweeted: “What an extraordinary messenger of beauty he was.”

Russell played keyboard for the Los Angeles studio team known as the Wrecking Crew, helping producer Phil Spector develop his game-changing wall of sound approach in the 1960s.

He wrote Joe Cocker’s “Delta Lady” and in 1969 put together Cocker’s “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” tour, which spawned a documentary film and a hit double album.

As a musician, primarily a pianist, he played on The Beach Boys’ “California Girls” and landmark “Pet Sounds” album, Jan and Dean’s “Surf City,” the Ronettes’ “Be My Baby,” and the Byrds’ “Mr. Tambourine Man.” He also played guitar and bass.

Russell produced and played on recording sessions for Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, Ike and Tina Turner, the Rolling Stones and many others. He arranged the Turners’ “River Deep, Mountain High.”

He also recorded hit songs like “Tight Rope” and “Lady Blue” and participated in “The Concert for Bangla Desh.” John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison played on his first album, “Leon Russell.”

Later, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin and Willie Nelson were among those to cover Russell’s ballad “A Song for You” that he wrote for the album.

His concerts often ended with a rousing version of “Jumpin’ Jack Flash.” In 1973, Billboard Magazine listed Russell as the top concert attraction in the world. About this time, he was the headline act on billings that included Elton John and at other times Willie Nelson.

In a 1992 interview with The Associated Press, Russell said music doesn’t really change much.

“It’s cyclical, like fashion. You keep your old clothes and they’ll be in style again sooner or later.

“There are new things, like rap. But that’s a rebirth of poetry. It’s brought poetry to the public consciousness.”

In 2011, Russell was chosen for induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He also was honored with an Award for Music Excellence from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

He and Elton John released “The Union,” a critically received duo album in 2010.

“He was a mentor, inspiration and so kind to me,” Elton John said in a Facebook post Sunday. “Thank God we caught up with each other and made ‘The Union’. He got his reputation back and felt fulfilled. I loved him and always will.”

Born Claude Russell Bridges in Lawton, Oklahoma, Russell began as a nightclub piano player in Oklahoma at the age of 14, also backing touring artists when they came to town. Jerry Lee Lewis was so impressed with Russell that he hired Russell and his band for two years of tours.

He relocated to Los Angeles in 1959, where he became known as a top musician, and later to Nashville.

In the early 2000s he began his own record label, Leon Russell Records.

Bruce Springsteen Rescued by Veterans on Remembrance/Veterans Day After Motorcycle Breaks Down

Bruce Springsteen went out for a ride and may not have gotten back if not for some good Samaritans on Remembrance/Veterans Day (Nov. 11).

Springsteen took advantage of a warm day in New Jersey by taking a spin on his motorcycle, but it broke down on the side of the road by Allaire State Park. At the same time, members of the Freehold American Legion Post 54 Legion Riders — who represented Post 54 at the Veterans Day Ceremony in Holmdel for Veterans Day — had the same idea to enjoy the nice weather and take a ride to Manasquan before returning home to Freehold.

As members Dan Barkalow, Bob Grigs, Donald Clayton and Ryan Baily were making their way through the backstreets — er, backroads — back to Freehold, they noticed a scared and lonely rider on the side of Allaire Road calling out for help. The veterans pulled over and discovered it was Springsteen. Baily had the Boss climb onto his bike, and the men gave him a ride to Mulligan’s, a restaurant in Farmingdale, N.J., where the 67-year old rocker made a call for a pickup.

After the guys went inside, sat down and had a few drinks, the thankful singer threw in $100, told them to keep the change, posed for a few pictures and took their phone numbers — presumably for future rides, or one heck of a thank-you note.

Singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen dead at 82

Legendary Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen has died at the age of 82.

“My father passed away peacefully at his home in Los Angeles with the knowledge that he had completed what he felt was one of his greatest records. He was writing up until his last moments with his unique brand of humour,” said his son, Adam, in a statement.

Cohen carved out a unique place in pop music. In an industry where many artists burst onto the scene with a supernova of activity in their 20s and then dine out on past glories for decades, Cohen released some of his most vital work after age 50.

He released his 14th studio album, You Want It Darker, in October 2016, which his son helped to produce.

“There were only a few hours a day that we could work. I was dealing with an ailing old man, but an ailing old man who was showing paranormal levels of devotion and focus, and that rubbed off on everybody,” Adam told Maclean’s.

Cohen also had a daughter, Lorca. Their mother is artist Suzanne Elrod.

There will be a memorial in Los Angeles at a later date. The family is requesting privacy now.

Cohen’s manager, Robert Kory, said he was “unmatched in his creativity, insight, and crippling candor,” and a “true visionary whose voice will be sorely missed.”

“He leaves behind a legacy of work that will bring insight, inspiration, and healing for generations to come.”

Sony Music Canada also put out a statement, saying Cohen “was an unparalleled artist whose stunning body of original work has been embraced by generations of fans and artists alike.”

Cohen’s late career renaissance was in part related to the “gift of a golden voice.”

Derided by many early in his career as flat and atonal, his voice by the 1980s had grown deeper — whiskey and cigarettes helped on that score, he liked to say — and gave Cohen an authoritative air for his sombre songs and a sly, gritty finish for his ballads.

Cohen wrote Hallelujah, what is likely the most-covered song of recent years. Bob Dylan performed it at a 1988 Montreal concert, John Cale soon followed with a version for a Cohen tribute album, and Jeff Buckley heard Cale’s version and brought the song to a generation of younger fans.

At one point on the U.K. charts in 2008 there were three versions of Hallelujah present, including Cohen’s original, and the song has been performed in hundreds of versions, in several languages.

Accolades for Cohen poured in from all corners over the years, from the CBC Prize for New Literary Writing (1961) to the Canadian Music Hall of Fame (1991), the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame (2006), and the International Glenn Gould Prize (2011).

“We’re so lucky to be alive at the same time Leonard Cohen is,” Lou Reed said while inducting the Canadian into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008.

Cohen was born Sept. 21, 1934, in Montreal, the oldest of two children to a father who was a clothier and a mother who sang Yiddish and Russian folksongs to her children. His father died when he was nine.

As a teen, Cohen was enchanted by Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca, and jazz and folk music. While at McGill University he would fall under the sway of writers and teachers like Hugh MacLennan and, especially, Irving Layton, so much so that he abandoned law school to pursue a literary career.

Cohen spent much of the early ’60s in Hydra, Greece, with longtime girlfriend Marianne Ihlen, and would embark on two novels there.

A publicity ad for The Favourite Game described a protagonist “born into the conventional world of Westmount’s moneyed Jewry,” who “throws aside convention in his pursuit of love and life.” It wasn’t autobiographical, Cohen protested.

Beautiful Losers followed, an experimental and sexually explicit book that was inventive to some and off-putting to others — Robert Fulford of the Toronto Star called it “the most revolting book ever written in Canada.”

Cohen struggled to make a living in his literary career, he later said, and found encouragement for songs he’d written for the New York folk scene.

He auditioned for talent scout John Hammond (Billie Holliday, Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin) and was signed to Columbia Records. Singer Judy Collins was Cohen’s most ardent new fan, recording about a half-dozen songs of his before his debut came out, including Suzanne and Sisters of Mercy.

Those songs as well as So Long, Marianne were on his first album Songs of Leonard Cohen, released at the end of 1967.

“In hindsight it seems like a mad decision that I was going to rectify my economic situation by becoming a singer,” he told the CBC’s Adrienne Clarkson in 1989.

Cohen’s audience was small but devoted, more likely to be found in the U.K. and Europe or among tastemakers and musicians already in the industry.

Songs from a Room (1969) was arguably weirder and starker, recorded with seasoned Nashville players but also containing some vocals in French and a synthesizer. Lead track Bird on a Wire became a touchstone Cohen composition, one songwriting ace Kris Kristofferson said he’d like on his tombstone (“I’ve tried in my way to be free.”).

Cohen’s ability to depict women in their complexity, not to mention his dapper attire and self-effacing manner, saw his fanbase skew female. He had female singers and musicians in his band throughout his career, with the likes of Jennifer Warnes, Laura Branigan and Anjani Thomas going on to release their own work.

After a relationship with actress Rebecca DeMornay ended, Cohen later said he got burned out and drank too much on tour. He sought quietude at the Mt. Baldy Buddhist retreat near L.A. for a period of years and later admitted that depression held sway for a good chunk of the ’90s.

“I tried all the conventional remedies — wine, women and song,” he said upon his musical return with 2001’s Ten New Songs. “Nothing worked, including religion.”

He returned to touring in 2008 for mostly prosaic reasons, after a longtime business manager had swindled millions he wouldn’t recover. She would later be jailed for harassing Cohen.

Cohen chose Fredericton, N.B., for his long-awaited return to the stage in May 2008, wanting to avoid the hubbub of a major international market until he found his performing legs.

Cohen had once likened live shows to a bullfight, but he would come to cherish the communion with his fans.

In England, Cohen referred to his previous London show 15 years earlier: “I was 60 years old, just a kid with a crazy dream.”