Review: Sincerely L. Cohen at Moana Hall

Sincerely L. Cohen at Moana Hall
w/ Sylvia Cornes and friends
Wednesday, February 7, 2024

Moana Hall, upstairs off the Hay Street Mall, is the perfect venue for the songs of Leonard Cohen. A crumbling Federation ballroom, recently renovated but showing signs of water damage, has a deeply scarred, old-world gravitas—pretty much like Cohen’s take on the human conundrum.

Singer Sylvia Cornes and her friends, violinist extraordinaire Emily Gelineau and the dapper guitarist Henry Clarke, did Cohen proud in their Fringe World show. The full room on opening night (the first of two shows) sat in rapt silence as this highly accomplished trio delivered one splendid song after another.

Many of the numbers were prefaced by Cornes’ sparsely accompanied recitations of a Cohen poem or deconstructed lyric that then segued effortlessly into another more familiar song. As well as a clever way to pack in the material, this took the show to the next level and made it a true tribute to the great poet Cohen was. The melding of his most famous early love song, So Long Marianne, with the email he sent to his old flame as she lay on her death bed was particularly poignant.

The full range of Cohen’s oeuvre was covered; there was at least one airing from some dozen of the studio albums. The emphasis fell on the earlier, more acoustic material—Suzanne, Sisters of Mercy, Chelsea Hotel—which made sense given their instrumentation. But even so, their stirring rendition of You Want It Darker, an electronic track from the last album Cohen released before he died, was very funky. Other notable works from his middle and late phases—Anthem, In My Secret Life and A Thousand Kisses Deep—were covered in the recitations.

It was great to hear Cohen’s songs sung so beautifully—despite his joke in The Tower of Song, Lennie did not have a golden voice. In contrast, Cornes and her companions all have strong and distinctive singing styles. Cornes and Gelineau soared, often with rich harmonies on the choruses, much like Cohen’s last vocal collaborators, the Webb sisters, while Clarke, with his Rufus Wainwright-like inflections, grounded them. His male edge was vital on those essentially masculine verses that never sit easily on a female voice.

Cornes has come back to singing after a stint of acting—she performed on stage in London for a time after completing her BA. Most of her formal training came through specialist performing arts programs in primary and high school, with a diversion during high school into an intensive course at the Academy of Performing Arts. She abandoned acting in favour of the greater autonomy that performing in a band provides. On returning to Perth, she studied singing under jazz diva Libby Hammer, who encouraged her to develop some shows for Fringe World.

Sincerely L. Cohen is Cornes’ second show at this year’s festival. Her first, Yé-Yé-Yeah, at the start of the Fringe World season, focused on the French yé-yé music, a more upbeat dance style. That show featured songs by Serge Gainsbourg and Françoise Hardy and was presented with a full band.

Through her family, Cornes grew up with Cohen’s music—her parents were both big fans—but it was only after his death, when she heard First Aid Kit’s Who By Fire tribute concert, that she became hooked. By listening intensely to all of Cohen’s recordings as well as the many other tribute albums and concerts, she has found her way into the heart of the work.

Her choice of repertoire stuck to the better-known songs, culminating naturally enough in his greatest hit, Hallelujah. Some of the arrangements were developed by the trio themselves, but most were written especially for the show by Libby Hammer. Original and effective, simple but lush, the violin and guitar, with occasional glockenspiel (Gelineau), were a great combination.

Throughout, they pulled the melodies apart to find strong and original harmonic patterns underlying them—sometimes with delightfully rhythmic and rousing results. Highlights included the extended sparring between violin and guitar at the end of Who By Fire and the diverse timbres, tempos and rhythms they unearthed in their rendition of Famous Blue Raincoat.

In some songs, they followed the Hal Willner arrangements from the legendary Came So Far For Beauty tribute concert. If It Be Your Will in particular benefited from the extended Willner/Antony Hegarty ethereal ending. The soaring vocal over a repeated round of chords was powerful, an orgasmic finale for that deeply moving ‘hymn’. Another of the show’s highlights, it shivered its fingers down your spine.

The audience was a mixed group—all ages, from younger hipsters through to lifelong Cohen fans. They were a reverential lot: sitting still throughout, often with eyes closed, mesmerised by the poetry and music—a room full of trembling souls.

The simple stage dressing lent itself to this meditative atmosphere. The mic stands and window ledge behind the 'stage' were draped in string lights, the ledge dotted with fat Catholic candles. It was apt, not only for the mood of the show but also as a nod to Cohen once famously decking the Columbia recording studio in New York with candles. A sensual ambiance, warm and soft.

The 75-minute show passed quickly, but at the end, the audience was not quite replete, making it the perfect place to leave it.

Thanks to artists like Sylvia Cornes, Laughing Lenny is alive and well and stirring souls still with his deep, spirit-filled songs.

Cornes is presenting both of her Fringe World shows again on a single bill at Lyric’s Underground on Thursday, March 7.

IAN LILBURNE

Photos by Alan Holbrook