Peter Frampton’s Long Lost Guitar to Come Alive This Saturday

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31 years after Peter Frampton thought he lost his favorite guitar in a fiery plane crash it was returned to him this past December. Now, the 1954 Gibson Les Paul will make its triumphant return to music this Saturday in New York City!

Peter Frampton Inducted into Music City…

The story of the guitar belonging to Frampton started in 1970 when his band Humble Pie was playing the Fillmore West in San Francisco. His own instrument kept feeding back so he borrowed the guitar from a man named Mark Mariana for his sets.

“I used it for both sets and my feet didn’t touch the ground,” he recalled. saying he thought, “This is the best guitar I have ever played.”

After the show Frampton tried to buy the instrument, but Mariana insisted on giving it to him instead. It quickly became his favorite. He ended up playing it on a couple of Humble Pie albums and all of his solo records including his iconic Frampton Comes Alive.

The guitar was on a cargo plane that was destroyed in a fire after crashing on takeoff in Venezuela in 1980. But the guitar was plucked from the fire and ended up being sold to a musician on the Dutch Caribbean island of Curaçao.

Last month Ghatim Kabbara of the Curaçao tourist board presented Frampton with the same guitar he thought had burned 31 years ago.

Frampton said he knew as soon as he picked up the guitar that it was the same 1954 Gibson Les Paul with customized pickups that he played for a decade.

“For 30 years, it didn’t exist – it went up in a puff of smoke as far as I was concerned.”

After recently obtaining it, the guitar was repaired in Nashville and Frampton plans to use it this Saturday for the first time in 32 years.

“It was given to me, taken away from me via a fiery plane crash, then given back to me 31 years later. To think that I would ever play this guitar again is beyond belief. After some repairs have now been finished at Gibson in Nashville, I will be able to play it on stage at the Beacon Theater, NYC Saturday, 18th Feb. It will be one of those days I won’t forget as long as I live.”

Frampton is currently on a world tour celebrating the 35th anniversary of his landmark album Frampton Comes Alive.