Much of New England experienced several occasions of cold temperatures + high winds + bright sunshine this past winter. Rhododendrons suffered branch dieback and winter burn on the leaves, especially on the windward side. There's not much to do except cut back branches to live tissue and wait for the growth of new leaves. It's unlikely entire plants are dying. They will recover but may not look great for a while.

I was just uploading photos of this but now I won't have to.
I'm afraid if I cutback the Rhododendron now
it won't flower.

I often wonder how Rhododendrons do in the Northeast
the winters here must have had the same conditions before?

I guess I am in a similar condition here as the New Englanders... any way to salvage this Kabarett at all? It was only planted last summer and didn't do too well with the hard winter we have had here in Nova Scotia (Canada) - can I just remove the damaged leaves and hope for new growth? Any advice would be appreciated!

Sorry I forgot to add a pic of the Kabarett

Wait a while before cutting back so you can see where new green growth is beginning. Pruning now will eliminate this year's flower buds, but if the leaves are brown and curled chances are there won't be much of a flower anyway.

Some years are worse than others for winter injury in the east. This tends to have more to do with wind and sunshine than it does with cold. The truth is that if you want your rhododendrons to look their best in the spring, protection with burlap, garden fabric or evergreen boughs is a tedious but ultimately rewarding practice. Varieties of rhododendron with thick leaves are much less prone to injury than thinner leaved ones.

I don't know why I had trouble posting my pics, usually I don't but I think I have it figured out now...this is the pic of the damaged plant, I have another one right next to it that looks in excellent shape, so I am not sure why this guy did so badly....

My last attempt!

{{gwi:386963}}

{{gwi:386964}}

It looks like the part that was sticking out of the snow got wind and sun burned fairly bad.

I'm far enough north that pretty much whatever parts of any large-leaved rhododendron spend the winter emergent from the snow look like your photos at the end of every winter. Based on my experience, if I were you, I would not do anything for a while. Although they look pretty bad, I always find that the buds expand, the plants bloom, and then the new leaves emerge. Somewhere in that process the nasty looking leaves drop off, and the plants look fine. During winter, I do shovel any loose snowfalls around the base of my large-leaved rhodies anytime we have a light, dry snow to help insulate them from sun,wind, and extreme temperatures. Some folks use plywood shades to help keep the winter sun (and probably also the really heavy wet or icy snows) off their rhodies, but I don't like the way they look.

We had a late extremely hard freeze/snow during this Spring's flowering. There is some growth, but lots of dry/dead branches. When the few blooms are finished can I cut back the dead and hope for regrowth? These are long established plants.

Several ice storms this past winter left my Rhododendron (8ft) with a lot of dead leaves, I have not prunned waiting to see if it will recover, is there any special type of fertilizer that you would suggest to aid the plant in the recovery process?

Rhododendrons don't normally need much fertilizing. If you do fertilize use a good rhododendron fertilizer with organic nitrogen like HollyTone. Always apply at half the rate on the package and only apply once soon after blooming, never after mid summer.

What is more important is cutting off the dead wood and mulching well.

Here is a link that might be useful: How to care for rhododendrons