USA: McCartney lyrics auctioned for $192,000 at Christie's Rock and Pop memorabilia sale

A Texas bookstore owner bought a rare page of working lyrics for Beatle Paul McCartney's song "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" for $192,000 at an auction of rock and pop memorabilia at Christie's on Monday (December 4). Bill Butler also won the bidding for one of rock legend Jimi Hendrix's electric guitars -- a 1968 Fender Stratocaster -- for $168,000, the guitar's strap for $10,800 and a photograph of Hendrix and band members Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell framed by two topless blondes for $5,400. "The Hendrix guitar did very well. It was purchased by a private collector who paid just double below estimate for it, so it performed very well on the day and we're very pleased with that," said auctioneer Helen Hall, the head of the Entertainment Department at Christie's. "The McCartney lyrics made just over $190 thousand without buyer's premium, so again a good indication of the strength of today's market. And both those lots were bought by a new buyer. So it shows there are some new buyers coming through, who are starting to collect really big ticket items like this," Hall added. Talking to reporters after the auction, Butler said he's worried about getting it all home. The Texas native said he came to New York specifically for the auction and the Jimi Hendrix memorabilia. "It's form my period. When I was a kid, when I was growing up, I liked Hendrix a lot and always will." Butler retired from the telecommunications industry before opening his rare and used book shop in Rosenberg, Texas, just outside Houston. He said he would display the guitar at his bookstore but would store the 1968 McCartney lyrics in a fireproof file cabinet. Butler lost the bidding for a black leather vest worn on stage by Hendrix. The vest was bought for $28,800 by Don Bernstine, who acquires rock memorabilia for the Hard Rock Cafes, hotels and casinos. Other big sellers included a notebook containing handwritten lyrics by reggae star Bob Marley, which went for $72,000, and a handwritten poem by Doors singer Jim Morrison, "The American Night," which was sold for $50,400. Both went to private collectors in the United States. Prices included buyer's premiums. Christie's fall New York auction of 147 lots of guitars, clothing, handwritten lyrics and other memorabilia took in a total of $1,117,920 from people who placed bids in person, by phone and over the Internet. That total was at the upper end of the auction house's estimate of $800,000 to $1.1 million. However, a review of Sophocles' "Antigone" written as a junior high school assignment by pop star Britney Spears fetched only about $250, to laughter and applause from bidders, far below the low estimate of $500 -- despite auctioneer Helen Hall's best efforts. "It's interesting actually, it just shows in an auction scenario you can offer two very similar pieces and it just depends whose there on the day. We sold another piece of Britney Spears' homework a couple of years back and that made over a thousand dollars. So it just shows you it just depends whose there on the day," Hall said. The auction also included items connected to Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Madonna, the Jackson Five, Elvis Presley, Bruce Springsteen, Miles Davis and others. A previously unheard and undocumented interview with John Lennon for Crawdaddy music magazine was sold for $38,400 and an acoustic guitar Dylan played during camping trips went for $24,000. A handwritten 1972 letter by John Lennon to a music magazine about the political situation in Northern Ireland fetched $24,000.

ITN Source | December 7, 2006

Tags:. .paid. .sold. .retired. .photograph. .bruce