Late Kraftwerk icon Florian Schneider’s instruments will go up for auction
Instruments belonging to the late Kraftwerk musician, Florian Schneider, are set to go up for auction.
The electronic music pioneer passed away from cancer, aged 73, in 2020. Now, much of his equipment and instruments used to create some of the group’s biggest songs are up for auction. The official sale includes almost 500 of his personal possessions from his estate.
More than 100 brass and woodwind instruments will be included in the sale. Additionally, fans have the chance to get their hands on his suitcase synthesiser, his flute and his vocoders.
A collection of Polaroid photographs, which are on sale for $100 to $200, that Schneider took of his woodwind and brass instruments. Polaroids of him wearing gold-framed green-lens sunglasses, as well as the glasses themselves, are also available.
Two vehicles are also included in the sale: his VW panel van, which he custom-painted grey, and his Panasonic Panaracer bicycle, which can be seen in Kraftwerk’s ‘Tour de France’ single artwork and music video. His passport from 1978 is also up for grabs.
The sale will be held on November 19th by Julien’s Auctions at the Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville, Tennessee. The total estimated value is anywhere between £335,000 and £485,000.
The auction description promises buyers “a rare chance to own pieces that shaped electronic music”.
Kraftwerk recently announced their first UK and Ireland tour in almost a decade. Soon thereafter, they added more dates due to high demand.
Their return to the UK and Ireland will kick off in Dublin on May 17th, with stops to follow in Belfast, Wolverhampton, Manchester, Glasgow, Stockton, Sheffield, Brighton, Bristol, Bournemouth, London, Liverpool, Nottingham and Edinburgh.
This summer, they also played a select number of festivals and outdoor shows in the UK and Europe, including Forever Now at Milton Keynes, Jazz Open in Stuttgart, Teatro Greco in Taormina, as well as OFF Festival in Katowice.
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