Equipment used by John Lennon in the studio where he recorded Imagine is to be sold at auction.
The collection from Ascot Sound Studios includes his microphones, tape machines and even Ringo Starr's coffee percolator.The online auction, which starts on May 11, is expected to raise more than £300,000. Lennon built the studios in 1970 in the grounds of Tittenhurst Park, Berkshire, the Georgian manor he owned with his wife Yoko Ono.
Lennon sold it to Ringo a few years later, and he lived there until the late Eighties. The house was also the site of The Beatles last photo session in 1969, for the album Hey Jude. Other items for sale include a mixing desk from Abbey Road studios. The owner of the equipment has chosen to remain anonymous.
Hamish Jackson, who is organising the auction for sales firm mjQ, said: "This equipment has such a fantastic heritage, and the build quality back then was so good, that it is all still in working order. Anything involving The Beatles will always be popular. My father ran an auction in 1980 of stuff from Abbey Road, and a roll of toilet paper which had property of EMI stamped on every sheet sold for £500. A few years ago, the same roll was on eBay for £30,000."
---Germaine Arnold
thisislondon.co.uk
