Ray Charles: The one singer Leonard Cohen would always recommend
In music, Leonard Cohen is a singular event. A writer, poet and musician, he was unlike anybody else, as his words were the epicentre of the universe, and his voice was deep like thunder. Unique is a word that was built around him, as while people have attempted to imitate the work and style of Cohen since his rise to fame, nobody has come close to resonating with an audience in the same way that he does.
Cohen speaks sweetly in his music and is also incredibly poetic when describing his contemporaries. Despite having such a unique style, Cohen was never so proud as to say that he had no influence. There were plenty of artists he admired and loved listening to, and he was never shy about shining a light on them.
One artist he was always happy to praise was Bob Dylan. The two had a comparable writing style, so many thought that some form of rivalry might develop; however, the opposite happened. Both artists were huge fans of one another, to the extent that when Cohen was asked what he thought about Bob Dylan winning the Nobel Prize for Literature, he said it was “Like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain.”
Despite Cohen’s happiness in embracing his favourite artists, there is one person whom he constantly recommended to others but very rarely talked about: Ray Charles. Whenever you read lists of songs that Leonard Cohen recommends or highlights as his favourite, you can almost guarantee that Ray Charles will get some form of a mention, and yet Cohen didn’t speak much about what it was about Charles that appealed to him.
For instance, during an interview when Leonard Cohen was asked to put together a list of his favourite songs of all time, Ray Charles was the only artist he mentioned twice, as Cohen included the songs ‘Take These Chains From My Heart’ and ‘Losing Hand’. This is no small achievement, given that other artists mentioned in this list include Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin, and Chopin. So, what was it about Ray Charles that Cohen liked so much?
The first thing will have been his voice. This may seem obvious, but it would seem silly to talk about Ray Charles without mentioning his gorgeous vocals. Every word that came out of the blues singer’s mouth was packed with heart and soul. Whether he was singing somebody else’s words or something he had written himself, he delivered it with an unwavering compassion that’s difficult to imitate.
For instance, the Ray Charles song ‘Take These Chains From My Heart’, which Cohen referenced as one of his favourites, was originally written by Fred Rose and recorded by Hank Williams. A lot of emotion undercuts this song. When Hank Williams recorded the original, it was shortly after his relationship with his wife had broken down due to creative differences and alcohol abuse.
Charles is able to not only emulate this emotion but also turn it up further in his version. There is longing and pain in his performance, but also a strange gratitude, as if to say that love can be cruel, but he is still grateful for the feeling of it. The public resonated with his rendition, as the song managed to climb the charts and reach number eight.
Cohen no doubt enjoyed the narrative style that Charles employed throughout his music as well. On the songs that he did help write, such as the aforementioned ‘Losing Hand’, Charles can continue conveying that emotion while telling a deeply resonating story at the same time. In this instance, it’s a tale of love but told under the guise of a poker game. “I gambled on your love, baby, and got a losing hand,” the R&B superstar sings.
The writing style isn’t a million miles away from Cohen. While the end product doesn’t resemble anything that Cohen made, that mode of writing, incorporating a theme to masquerade a deeper meaning, is very much in line with how Cohen liked to write. He did something similar on his final album, You Want It Darker, with the track ‘Leaving the Table’, where he uses a game of poker as a metaphor for life while writing knowing that his days were numbered. “I’m leaving the table, I’m out of the game,” he sings.
When you look at the number of times Leonard Cohen cited Ray Charles’s songs as his favourite and how often he recommended the blues and R&B legend, there’s no denying he was a huge fan. While his comments on Charles are sparse, when you hear the emotion with which he sings and his intricate writing style, the comparisons to Cohen are there to be heard. With all things considered, it’s easy to see why Leonard Cohen was such a big fan of Ray Charles.
