A Hallelujah for Leonard Cohen, Institut sefarad, Madrid

On March 26, the Sefarad-Israel Center and the Canadian Embassy will pay tribute to Leonard Cohen with an event dedicated to exploring his poetic and musical work, highlighting the spiritual depth and enduring relevance of his legacy that links Canada with Spain.

Chantal Ringuet , Canadian essayist, author, and translator specializing in memory, translation, and Yiddish literature, consultant for the exhibition Leonard Cohen. Une brèche en toute chose, and Mordecai Richler Writer-in-Residence at McGill University in 2024, will participate alongside José Manuel Errasti Pérez , PhD in Psychology, professor at the University of Oviedo, and director since 2022 of the Leonard Cohen Institutional Chair, a researcher in identity, contemporary culture, and the formation of the self in the modern city. They will offer a complementary perspective—literary and philosophical—that will situate Cohen at the crossroads of Jewish tradition, modernity, and artistic creation. They will be accompanied by a musical interlude featuring several songs performed by Héctor Tuya , whose childhood was marked by Leonard Cohen's influence, which has shaped his career. Tuya has developed his musical career as a guitarist, singer, songwriter, soloist, and producer. His album La Caja Negra received the Tino Casal Award for Best Album of the Year 2017. He is currently finalizing the release of another album and a book (published by EOLAS), which will be released in 2026.

Leonard Norman Cohen (Montreal, 1934 – Los Angeles, 2016) was a Canadian Jewish singer-songwriter, poet, and novelist. Considered “one of the most fascinating and enigmatic singers and songwriters of the late 1960s,” he developed a style marked by the tension between mysticism and everyday life, faith and desire, memory and the present. In 2011, he received the Prince of Asturias Award for Literature.

A tribute to rediscover Leonard Cohen as a poet of memory and a bridge between Jewish tradition, Canadian culture and universal sensibility.

Event in Spanish and French. Simultaneous translation service available.

Sefarad-Israel Center (C/ Mayor, 69 – Madrid)