A SOLID-BODY ELECTRIC GUITAR, MARK KNOPFLER SIGNATURE STRATOCASTER

See footnote to lot 92. According to Mark Knopfler’s guitar tech Glenn Saggers, Mark wanted to try something different with one of his Signature Stratocasters by replacing the Texas Specials with ‘lipstick’ style pickups for a warm and twangy tone. Seymour Duncan created a custom pickguard for the guitar, incorporating his own line of lipstick pickups.

The modified Strat became Mark’s dressing room guitar when he joined Bob Dylan for the Bob Dylan With Mark Knopfler Tour of the UK and Europe from October to November 2011, as part of Dylan’s Never Ending Tour 2011. Knopfler told us: 'I would always have a guitar in the dressing room, like a Stratocaster or something like that - an electric guitar. I wouldn't necessarily be bugging people with it, so it wouldn't necessarily be plugged in, but it would just be to loosen up a little bit while you were waiting to get on the stage.'

Typically, Knopfler and his band would play the opening set, followed by Dylan and his band, with a regular crossover where Mark would accompany Dylan on guitar for a few songs - a rarity that reflected the great respect and long history of musical collaboration between the two legends, dating back to the recording of Dylan’s studio album Slow Train Coming in 1979. On the last night of their six-week joint tour at London’s Hammersmith Apollo on 21 November 2011, Knopfler joined Dylan on stage for the last encore of his set for a special show-closing duet of ‘Forever Young’ from Dylan’s 1974 album Planet Waves, with Knopfler sharing vocals as well as bending the strings on this distinctive ‘Danelectro’ style Strat. As always, keyboardist Guy Fletcher chronicled the event in his online tour diaries: 'Bob and Mark had agreed during sound-check to do an encore together. ‘Forever Young’ as a duet... When the time came, Bob had finished ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ and Mark walked back onto the stage the audience went bananas… After a beautiful guitar solo from Mark, in the third verse Mark sang the line “And may your song always be sung” whilst gesturing to Bob, I thought the roof was about to be lifted off the Odeon... It was the perfect end to the tour and there must have been the odd tear in the house.' As far as we know, no official video was filmed during this rare impromptu performance, however it can be found in circulating fan footage.

After the Bob Dylan With Mark Knopfler 2012 Tour, during which the Strat once again served as Mark's dressing room guitar, it was decided that the Seymour Duncan pickups sounded too much like a Strat. As Knopfler was looking for more of a classic Danelectro sound, Saggers acquired two sets of modern Danelectro pickups and had them rewound to old specs. British luthier Bill Puplett rewired the guitar so that the second tone potentiometer became a two-way rotary switch, where the 'A' position followed standard Strat wiring, while the 'B' position could turn the instrument into a Danelectro style guitar. The body was routed to accommodate the larger pickups and a custom pickguard was made to complete the modification. This unique Signature Strat has since served as Mark’s home guitar in open C tuning.