World's Most Valuable Guitars

Dave Gilmour's "Black Strat", a 1969/1983 Fender Stratocaster, became the most valuable guitar ever sold at auction (or anywhere else for that matter), when it fetched $3,975,000 at a Christie's auction in 2019 (Christie's)

Dave Gilmour's "Black Strat", a 1969/1983 Fender Stratocaster, became the most valuable guitar ever sold at auction (or anywhere else for that matter), when it fetched $3,975,000 at a Christie's auction in 2019 (Christie's)

Dave Gilmour's "Black Strat", a 1969/1983 Fender Stratocaster, became the most valuable guitar ever sold at auction (or anywhere else for that matter), when it fetched $3,975,000 at a Christie's auction in 2019 (Christie's)

Dave Gilmour's "Black Strat", a 1969/1983 Fender Stratocaster, became the most valuable guitar ever sold at auction (or anywhere else for that matter), when it fetched $3,975,000 at a Christie's auction in 2019 (Christie's)

This is the guitar John Lennon used in his initial songwriting collaborations with Paul McCartney, writing "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "Please, Please, Me", "All My Loving", "From Me to You" and many more of The Beatles' early hits were recorded with it too. (Julien's)

This is the guitar John Lennon used in his initial songwriting collaborations with Paul McCartney, writing "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "Please, Please, Me", "All My Loving", "From Me to You" and many more of The Beatles' early hits were recorded with it too. (Julien's)

This is the guitar John Lennon used in his initial songwriting collaborations with Paul McCartney, writing "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "Please, Please, Me", "All My Loving", "From Me to You" and many more of The Beatles' early hits were recorded with it too. (Julien's)

This is the Gibson J-160E guitar that John Lennon used in his initial songwriting collaborations with Paul McCartney, writing "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", "Please, Please, Me", "All My Loving", "From Me to You" while using this guitar. In addition to facilitating history, many more of The Beatles' early hits were recorded with it too. The guitar sold for $2,902,000 in 2015. (Julien's)

This 2005 Fender Stratocaster was sold at an auction co-ordinated by Canadian singer-songwriter Bryan Adams, in Doha, Qatar on November 16, 2005, to raise funds for the tsunami charity, Reach out to Asia. The guitar fetched $2,700,000 to become the most expensive guitar ever sold at the time. (Reach out to Asia)

This blonde, maple-necked 1968 Fender Stratocaster guitar was used by Jimi Hendrix to perform “The Star Spangled Banner” at the Woodstock Festival in August, 1969. It last traded publicly at auction in April, 1990, when Jimi Hendrix Experience drummer Mitch Mitchell entrusted the guitar to Sotheby's and it sold for £198,000 ($325,000), to become the world's most valuable guitar at that time. It was subsequently sold for a reported US$2.0 million in 2008 to the Experience Music Project (a non-profit museum, dedicated to contemporary popular culture and founded by Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Paul Allen) which subsequently morphed into the EMP Museum, and is now the Museum of Pop Culture. It still bears the markings of Hendrix' provenance, with stains on the back from Hendrix' colorful shirts, the nut has been reversed to accommodate the upside-down stringing and there are burns on the neck from Hendrix lodging cigarettes between the neck and strings and letting them burn down while he was playing it. ()