Mick Auction Site

[michelej1]

http://www.forbes.com/people/2000/10...?partner=links

Two Million Dollars For A Piano...Imagine That
David Einstein, 10.03.00, 3:40 PM ET

When is a piano worth more than $2 million? When it's the one on which John Lennon composed "Imagine." The Steinway once owned by the former Beatle is expected to fetch about $2.2 million when it goes up for bid Oct. 17 in an auction to be conducted live in London and online simultaneously.

The stratospheric value underscores the continuing popularity of the Fab Four 30 years after the band's breakup and 20 years after Lennon was gunned down outside his apartment building in New York. Were it not for the Lennon connection, the otherwise ordinary upright piano might not be worth much more than the $1,500 he paid for it.

This week two unrelated events are heightening interest in the auction: Lennon's killer, Mark David Chapman, got his first parole hearing today. While he had little chance of being released, the hearing sparked memories among baby boomers, many of whom recall vividly where they were the night the music died--apologies to Buddy Holly.

Secondly, 2000-style Beatlemania will kick into high gear Oct. 5 with the release of the much-anticipated Beatles Anthology, a coffee-table book in which the surviving Beatles recount the history of the band, including its acrimonious breakup. Setting the stage for what it hopes will be feverish demand for the book as well as other Beatles-related merchandise, today Amazon.com (nasdaq: AMZN - news - people) launched a Beatles-only store on its Web site.

The Lennon piano is being auctioned off by Fleetwood Owen , a company started by Fleetwood Mac founder Mick Fleetwood and veteran auctioneer Ted Owen . Their site specializes in musical instruments and other entertainment memorabilia. An Internet auction now in progress features items from rock greats including Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones and Elvis Presley.

If it brings in what the auctioneers are hoping for, the Lennon piano will be the most expensive example of pop memorabilia ever sold at auction, eclipsing the $497,000 paid last year for Brownie, the 1956 Fender Stratocaster guitar that Eric Clapton used to compose "Layla."

For Lennon's piano to claim the auction record for musical instruments, however, it would have to top $3 million. That's how much an anonymous buyer is said to have paid last fall for a 257-year-old Guarneri del Gesu violin that belonged to the late Yehudi Menuhin.

Lennon reportedly purchased the Steinway in 1970. The following year he used it to compose "Imagine," which became the trademark song of his post-Beatles career. The piano currently resides at the Beatles Story Museum in Liverpool, England, the birthplace of the band.