Hendrix's burnt guitar fetches half-million dollars at sale 1 day ago LONDON (AFP) — The first guitar that rock legend Jimi Hendrix burned on stage fetched 280,000 pounds (345,000 euros, 495,000 dollars) at an auction in London on Thursday. Also sold was the first management contract signed by The Beatles on January 24, 1962, which bears the names "John Winston Lennon", "George Harrison", "James Paul McCartney" and "Richard Starkey" (Ringo Starr). Hendrix set the 1965 Fender Stratocaster alight -- a gesture he later became famous for -- following a landmark performance at London's Finsbury Astoria in March 1967, and had to be taken to hospital to be treated for minor hand injuries afterward. At that point, the guitar was taken to the offices of his aide Tony Garland, and was kept at Garland's parents' garage in Hove in southern England, before Garland's nephew unearthed it in 2007. Ted Owen, director of acquisitions at the Fame Bureau rock memorabilia firm, which organised the sale, described Hendrix's act as "a watershed in live performance". "He raised the bar of what could be expected and paved the way for a series of imitations and pastiche that exist to this day," Owen said. Daniel Boucher, the 51-year-old American collector who bought the guitar, said it "changed music". "Obviously it is an investment, it couldn't not be an investment for that amount of money, but I bought it because I like it." He said he would have the guitar converted for right-hand playing -- Hendrix was left-handed -- so that he could play it himself. The contract signed by The Beatles, meanwhile, fetched 240,000 pounds at the auction, and also bears the names of Harrison's father Harold and McCartney's dad James as their sons were under the age of 21. Manager Brian Epstein added his name on October 1, 1962, after getting the fab four a deal with EMI for the release of "Love Me Do". Owen described the document as "the most important music contract of all time" which "completely changed the lives of The Beatles". "There's no other (contract) that's going to be historically, socially or politically as important as this," he said. Also in the auction was Jim Morrison's last notebook, which contains lyrics, poetry and musings from The Doors frontman, fingerprints of Elvis on a gun permit and the Bechstein piano used by The Beatles to record one of their biggest hits, "Hey Jude".
