Legendary Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen, known best for his haunting hit song Hallelujah, has died at the age of 82.
“It is with profound sorrow we report that legendary poet, songwriter and artist, Leonard Cohen has passed away,” a post on his Facebook page said.
“We have lost one of music’s most revered and prolific visionaries.”
Cohen was a hugely influential icon, who was already a celebrated poet and novelist when he moved to New York in 1966 at age 31 to break into the music business.
His debut album Songs of Leonard Cohen was released in 1967, one year after Bob Dylan’s widely-acclaimed record Blonde on Blonde.
Before long, critics were comparing the two iconic singer-songwriters and praising the lyrical force of Cohen’s songwriting.
Cohen’s most famous song, Hallelujah, in which he invoked the biblical King David and drew parallels between physical love and a desire for spiritual connection, has been covered hundreds of times since he released it in 1984.
Hallelujah gathered a renewed following when it was covered by Jeff Buckley in the 1990s.
Cogen was also loved for hits Suzanne, Bird on the Wire and Tower of Song.
Throughout his six-decade career in music, the singer-songwriter released 14 studio albums.
Although Cohen influenced many musicians and won many honours, he rarely made the pop music charts with his sometimes moody folk-rock.
He was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and the American Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Cohen was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010, received the Album of the Year award in 2008, and was inducted into Grammy Hall of Fame in 2015.
According to the Facebook post, a memorial will take place in Los Angeles at a later date.
This post originally appeared on ABC News.
