A 1957 Gretsch Chet Atkins 6120 electric guitar once owned by Jimmy Page was sold at auction for a hammer price of £100,000 on September 9.
The guitar was famously given away in a 1974 competition held by NME and reached double its £30,000 to £50,000 when sold by auction firm Gardiner Houlgate.
The sale was a “a fantastic result that exceeded all expectations”, auctioneer Luke Hobbs told LedZepNews.
“The guitar was fiercely contested by collectors worldwide, with bids coming in via both telephone and internet,” he added. “It was a true privilege to offer an ex-Jimmy Page guitar. Of all the artist-associated instruments I’ve been involved with, this has been my favourite journey, both for the remarkable story behind it and the rarity of the artist. Above all, I am delighted for the family.”
Page spoke to journalist Nick Kent about his guitar collection in an interview published alongside the competition in the October 12, 1974 issue of NME.
According to Page, he purchased the Gretsch guitar “about two years ago. It cost about £200 at a place called GTR, in Nashville. They do a whole lot of rare instruments and I asked them to look out for one marked with the branded ‘G’.”
“When I say £200, it came to that with the customs etc., but it originally cost 450 dollars. Very reasonable really. Les Pauls can cost 1500 dollars there,” Page explained.
“Eddie Cochran had one very similar to this,” Page added. “I think he customised it, though some people say it was made specially for him. It had an old block Gibson pick up by the neck and a branded G … an earlier version.”
“I think it’s a Chet Atkins hollowbody,” Page said. “A bloke who really knows about these things told me there’s another one in existance the same as Eddie Cochran’s made up by Gretsch. It’s somewhere in Tooting, I think.”
When asked by Kent why he purchased the guitar, Page explained: “Well, if you’re an Eddie Cochran guitar fan you’ll know why. It’s a good all-rounder with good acoustics when it’s strung up properly.”
In the magazine issue, Page famously posed wearing cricket whites, using the Gretsch guitar as a makeshift cricket bat.
The competition was won by Charles M. Reid of Barnet, who was presented with the guitar by Page at Swan Song’s 484 Kings Road office in London. Photographs of the presentation were published in the January 18, 1975 issue of NME.
“I’m pleased to see that it’s going to a good home,” Page said, according to the article.
Reid, meanwhile, was smitten with his new instrument. “Page must be mental giving away such a terrific guitar as this,” he told NME. “It’s the kind of classic instrument that every guitar player dreams of owning but can never really afford.”
The guitar, which bears the serial number 23243, was then sold for £2,000 on September 16, 1990 by Reid to Phil O’Donoghue of Chessington, Surrey, who was the guitarist in the band Wild Angels. O’Donoghue’s family sold the guitar following his death earlier this year.
According to the auction house, the only other times that guitars owned by Page have come up for sale were when a 2007 Martin D-28 acoustic guitar once owned by Page was sold through Bonhams auction house for £26,250 on July 3, 2013 and when a 1969 Gibson Firebird electric guitar once owned by Page was sold by ATB Guitars for £59,995 in 2024.
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