“He looked at it, closed the case and said, ‘Let’s get out of here before they realize what they’ve sold you’”: How Rory Gallagher grabbed his iconic 1963 Gretsch Corvette for the princely sum of $150

Rory had a lifelong affection for single-pickup student guitars that he often modded with more powerful pickups then played on the major stages of the world. Arguably, this guitar – serial number 60937 – is the most famous guitar of that style in Rory’s collection. Ironically, however, it was found by chance by Donal Gallagher while Rory browsed a nearby guitar store.

“This guitar was found on one of the many trips to LA we made over the years. We were there for just a few hours in the afternoon, and Rory said he wanted to visit a guitar store, I think it was called Valley Sound, and he knew the guy there. So I said, ‘Okay, Rory, let’s go down. But it’s a nightmare parking because there’s only a couple of meters.’

“So I dropped him at the place, and he said, ‘Oh, I think they have something I might want, I won’t be very long,’ and, of course, he walks in the door and I said, ‘Okay, I’ll stay with the car.’

“Going into guitar stores in places like LA, where they knew who Rory was, was always funny because you’d get other guys trying a guitar out and, of course, they’d see him and immediately start a Rory guitar riff at full volume, to show that they knew who he was.

“A lot of the time, my head wouldn’t be in the right space for that, but Rory took it gallantly. Anyway, he was in there and I was outside with the car. You’re not supposed to do it, but I kept feeding quarters into the parking meter, hoping the attendant wouldn’t spot me doing it, but I was getting so bored.”

“But then I realised we were parked outside a pawn shop, and I kind of looked and I thought, ‘Oh, I wonder if they have any spare guitar cases.’ We had this ongoing thing where Rory was picking up loads of guitars, but none of them had decent cases – or sometimes the original cases had been lost or they weren’t up to touring.

“And I thought, ‘Well, I’ll kill five minutes.’ So I went into the store and I said, ‘Would you have any guitar cases?’ and the guy said, ‘Oh, do you not want to buy a guitar?’ and I said, ‘No, no, I haven’t got the money for that.’ I was like, you know, pleading poverty.

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“I’d seen one case that looked good, but he said, ‘Oh, well, you’d have to buy this guitar to get the case.’ So I looked at it and it was a Gretsch Corvette. So I said, ‘How much do you want for that, then?’ and he said, ‘Oh, it’s $500.’ But I was seriously focusing on the very good case that it had. So in the end, I got him down to $150.

“I took it out and put it in the boot of the car, fed the meter some more and waited for Rory. Rory eventually came over, all disappointed that he hadn’t found anything, and I said, ‘Well, Rory, look, you’ll probably kill me for this, but I spotted they had a guitar… Actually, the case is probably much better than the guitar is.’

“So he said, ‘What is it?’ and I said, ‘It’s a Gretsch,’ and he said, ‘A Gretsch?’ and I opened the trunk of the car, he looked at it and he just closed it down again and said, ‘Let’s get out of here before they realise what they’ve sold you.’ [laughs]”

• The Rory Gallagher Collection will be auctioned at Bonhams in New Bond Street, London, on 17 October 2024.