The piano on which John Lennon composed “Imagine,” his famous ode to peace and healing, is on a yearlong magical mystery tour of the U.S. with a macabre twist.
The nutmeg-colored Steinway upright, believed to have been in Mr. Lennon’s country home in Ascot, England, is crisscrossing the country to show up at some of the nation’s most horrific sites of violence, death and destruction.
See the tour John Lennon’s Steinway has made through the country, to funerals and sites of devastation like New Orleans and Oklahoma City.It has popped up here and there with little fanfare, transported by white-gloved attendants in a moving truck who carefully unload the instrument to display it in parking lots, grassy fields and on street corners.
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While letting Ms. True run the show, Messrs. Michael and Goss did insist on one stop for the piano: the home of Gabi and Alec Clayton in Olympia, Wash., whose story they found while researching gay hate crimes on the Internet. Twelve years ago, the Claytons’ 17-year-old son killed himself after suffering a beating at his high school by an antigay gang.
Alec and I were interviewed for this.
Read: Why Piano Owned By John Lennon Is Touring America
It Pops Up in Places Known For Violence and Tragedy, From Waco to Virginia Tech
By ANN ZIMMERMAN
August 2, 2007; Page A1 of the Wall Street Journal
Also, watch the video: A Piano for Mourning on the Wall Street Journal website:
See the tour John Lennon’s Steinway has made through the country, to funerals and sites of devastation like New Orleans and Oklahoma City.