What does a local Jewish family-owned business have to do with John Lennon and the Fab Four?
Quite a bit, mate, and all you need is love … and a whole lotta cash. (But just remember, money can’t buy you love.)
Alex Cooper Auctioneers, a Towson-based auction company, recently announced the upcoming sale of the iconic Lennon-Ono-Green-Warhol Piano, one of the world’s most unique and collectible musical instruments. The live auction of what is known as the “Lost Lennon Piano” will take place this Saturday, Sept. 30, at 10 a.m. at Alex Cooper Auctioneers, located at 908 York Rd. Online bidding started last Friday evening, Sept. 15.
An invitational special reception was held on Wednesday at Alex Cooper Auctioneers, where a professional pianist performed Beatles and Lennon tunes on the instrument.
Originally located in the 400 block of N. Howard Street in downtown Baltimore, the company was founded in 1924 by Alex Cooper, a young Jewish immigrant from the Ukrainian town of Letichev. Four generations later, the company remains a family owned and operated enterprise.
The Sept. 30 auction will mark the first time that the iconic piano will be available to the public. Lennon, who was killed in December of 1980, used this piano to compose much of the “Double Fantasy” album, featuring such classics as “Woman,” “Beautiful Boy,” “Watching the Wheels” and “(Just Like) Starting Over.”
The 1929 Baldwin Concert Grand Model D Piano has direct, well-documented ties to Lennon, his wife Yoko Ono, Sam Green and Andy Warhol.
In 1979, Lennon and Ono originally gifted the piano to Green, a close friend and confidant who served as former director of the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania. The piano includes the original custom brass plaque from Lennon and Ono, including the inscription, “For Sam/Love From Yoko and John/1979.”
“The Lennon-Ono-Green-Warhol Piano is a legendary musical instrument with a singular and well-documented provenance and direct ties to John Lennon, Yoko Ono and Andy Warhol,” said Selden Morgan, director of sales and fine jewelry at Alex Cooper Auctioneers. “This piano offers the ultimate connection to the most influential musicians and artists of the 20th century and is an incredible opportunity for collectors.”
Lennon purchased the satin ebony piano from the Baldwin Factory Store in New York City in 1978 and later gave the instrument to Green, who the following year situated the piano at one of his cottages on Fire Island, New York. Green was named in Lennon’s will as custodian for his son, Sean Lennon, in the event that he and Yoko died while Sean was a minor.
After Lennon’s death, Green loaned the piano to acclaimed artist Andy Warhol, where it occupied a place of distinction for many years at Warhol’s fourth Factory, also the location of Interview magazine and Warhol Studios, at Madison Avenue and 33rd Street in New York City.
In 1987, Green loaned the piano to the New York Academy of Art, which sold the piano without Green’s knowledge or consent, resulting in a scandal surrounding the “Lost Lennon Piano.” Green filed a lawsuit against the New York Academy of Art in 2000, but dropped the suit a year later.
In 2018, the piano was donated to Mercersburg Academy, a private school in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania. Three years later, Alex Hernan, director of furniture at Alex Cooper, began working with Mercersburg Academy and the donor to assess the provenance of the musical instrument. Hernan secured Piano Finders to conduct a professional appraisal of the piano’s value and provenance, and has been an integral part of the process of bringing the Lennon-Ono-Green-Warhol Piano to auction.
“The Lennon-Ono-Green-Warhol Piano was a witness in the rooms it occupied, to the private lives of many celebrities, in an era that has become iconic in pop art and rock music, for which Andy Warhol, John Lennon and Yoko Ono were central figures,” reports Piano Finders appraiser Karen E. Lile in the official Provenance Report documenting the history of the Lennon-Ono-Green-Warhol Piano.
Proceeds from the sale of the piano will benefit Mercersburg Academy.
For information, visit alexcooper.com/blog/the-odyssey-of-the-lennon-ono-green-warhol-concert-grand-piano.
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