John Lennon’s Gibson J-160E Hits the Auction Block
Julien’s Auctions, the world’s premier entertainment and music memorabilia auction house announced the upcoming sale of the most historically important guitar associated with The Beatles ever to be offered – John Lennon’s original 1962 J-160E Gibson Acoustic guitar. The guitar has been lost for over 50 years and represents a rare and significant guitar to John Lennon’s history.
It’s September of 1962 and The Beatles’ John Lennon and George Harrison each purchase jumbo J-160E Gibson acoustic guitars from Rushworth’s Music House in Liverpool for £161. Never would one imagine that the guitars would become so significantly important to the history of the Beatles nor engage such an undeniably intriguing story of its future whereabouts. When purchased by two of the members of the Fab Four the guitars were the only ones of their type in the country which were said to have been flown to England by jet from America after being specially ordered.
The two guitars were identical apart from the serial numbers. In December 1963, during The Beatles Finsbury Park Christmas Show, John’s guitar went missing and he later replaced it with a 1964 model. This guitar was lost for over 50 years and will now be offered at Julien’s Auctions Icons & Idols Rock n’ Roll Auction event on Friday, November 6, 2015 and Saturday, November 7, 2015.
The Beatles traveled from Liverpool to London’s EMI Studios on September 11, 1962, the day after receiving the guitars. The first song recorded that day was “P.S. I Love You,” followed by “Love Me Do” It was Lennon who used this guitar on many of the recordings they did in 1962 and 1963 that required an acoustic guitar.
John so loved this particular guitar that he would take it home and wrote songs on it with Paul McCartney. Beatles hits like “She Loves You,” “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Please, Please, Me,” “All My Loving,” “From Me to You,” “This Boy” and more were written with this guitar. Historians and Beatles fans can also find this particular guitar on the UK singles “Please Please Me/Ask Me Why” and “From Me to You/Thank You Girl.”
No other guitar ever offered at auction can compare to the history this guitar has with The Beatles’ John Lennon. It also appeared on Please Please Me (album UK), Introducing The Beatles (album US VJ), The Early Beatles (album US Capitol), With The Beatles (album UK), Meet The Beatles (album US Capitol), The Beatles One (Album), The Beatles Anthology 1, Live At the BBC (The Beatles Album) and much more. In addition the guitar was used on the UK EPs such as The Beatles (No.1), The Beatles’ Hits, Twist and Shout and more. It can be seen in the November 22, 1963 videos of I Want to Hold Your Hand and This Boy.
Source: Premier Guitar
