Legendary Black Strat breaks record at auction

David Gilmour's famous Black Strat has been sold for 14.6 million dollars, breaking the record for the most expensive guitar ever.

Some guitars you buy to play, others to look at. And then there is a category that makes collectors worldwide slightly nervous. David Gilmour's 'Black Strat' undoubtedly belongs to the latter group and went under the hammer for a record sum.

The legendary 1969 Fender Stratocaster fetched 14,6 million dollars in New York. This instantly makes it the most expensive guitar ever sold.

Gilmour used the guitar on just about all the major Pink Floyd albums between 1970 and 1983. You can hear it again on The Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here en The Wall.

The sale was part of the collection of Jim Irsay, the American billionaire known for his hobby that got out of hand: collecting everything related to music and culture. After his death in 2025, a portion of it went under the hammer. Total proceeds: about 84 million dollars.

Funny detail: the same 'Black Strat' fetched less than 4 million dollars in 2019. So, in just a few years, its value has more than tripled. The previous record was held by Kurt Cobain, whose MTV Unplugged guitar sold for 6 million in 2020. That seems almost modest now.

Dutch touch

Other pieces also sold for substantial sums. For instance, a guitar owned by Cobain fetched 6,9 million dollars, and a piano belonging to John Lennon sold for 3,2 million. And there was even a small Dutch touch to the auction: Eric Clapton's so-called Fool-Gibson, painted by the Dutch artist collective The Fool, changed hands for just over 3 million dollars.