Jeff Beck Guitar Auction To Be Held In January 2025
A collection of over 130 items used by Jeff Beck, including over 90 guitars, will be auctioned by Christies in January 2025.
The guitar great died after contracting bacterial meningitis back in January 2023. He was 78 years old. The auction will run from 15 to 22 of January and can be explored here.
A press statement reads, “A celebration of the ultimate guitarist’s guitar hero, Christie’s is honoured to present Jeff Beck: The Guitar Collection, a live auction on 22 January 2025, in London. Spanning his almost six-decades-long career, from joining the Yardbirds in 1965 to his last tour in 2022, this unique auction presents over 130 guitars, amps, pedals, cases and ‘tools-of-the-trade’ used by the late, great guitar legend Jeff Beck (1944–2023).
It went on, “All the guitars he played tell a story and bear the unmistakable signs of his hands, from the Gibson Les Pauls – the ‘Yardburst’ he bought in London in 1966 and the iconic ‘Oxblood’ depicted on the cover of Blow By Blow – to the Gretsches inspired by Cliff Gallup of The Blue Caps, and the Fender Teles and Strats which were his ‘workhorses’, describing the latter with which his playing became synonymous as: “My Strat is another arm, it’s part of me. It doesn’t feel like a guitar at all. It’s an implement which is my voice.”
Amelia Walker, head of Private and Iconic Collections at Christie’s, wrote in a statement, “These are things that he used. They’ve got the indents of his fingernails on the fret boards. Some of them, the strings haven’t been changed for years. He played them hard. He didn’t see them as precious works of art – they were his tools to ply his trade with.”
Beck’s widow Sandra: “I know Jeff wanted for me to share this love. After some hard thinking I decided they need to be shared, played and loved again.”