In the late 1970s, when the Southern California Eagles became rock superstars, one of the band’s leading songwriters wrote a series of handwritten lyrics, including classic FM radio words such as “Hotel California.” Generated a memo.
And the documents disappeared.
Almost 50 years later, about 100 pages of stolen memos written by songwriter Don Henley at the State Supreme Court in Manhattan on Tuesday by Glenn Horowitz, a rare book dealer in New York, and two other men. Was charged with attempting to sell. Send it to law enforcement to create a story about the source of a treatise worth about $ 1 million.
“This action reveals the truth about the sale of a very personal stolen music souvenir hidden behind the legitimacy façade,” said Henry’s manager, Irving Azov. .. “No one has the right to sell illegally obtained property or profit from the complete theft of irreplaceable music history.”
The indictment was by Horowitz, 66, who helped create a bubbling market in the author’s archives and put together the filing cabinet equivalents of manuscripts, drafts, letters, and ephemera into a cohesive and sellable whole. He placed the treatises of Norman Mailer, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Tom Wolfe, Alice Walker and others in major academic libraries and mediated major transactions with musicians. In 2016, he sold Bob Dylan’s vast archive to two agencies in Oklahoma. That’s $ 20 million.
Horowitz and other defendants, Craig Insialdi, 58, and Edward Kocinski, 59, denied the charges.
“DA’s office claims non-existent crimes and unfairly undermines the reputation of respected professionals,” the lawyer said in a statement. “These men are innocent.”
Inciardi’s lawyer added that the men withdrew and were released at their own discretion.
The indictment is an amazing turn for New York City’s rare book and manuscript market leader, Horowitz, known for his keen business sense, deep literary learning and Showman’s talent.
Visit Manhattan’s Midtown office, with its terrace overlooking the sculpture gardens of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, for a glimpse of historical letters and stunning literary works. It is accompanied by a comment that viewing is off-record.
“As Glenn himself says, he’s a great combination of scholars and glyphers,” Rick Gekoski, a London bookstore who regularly traded with Horowitz, told The New York Times in 2007.
The memo at the heart of the incident, released on Tuesday, is the lyrical spine of what will be one of the most famous and ubiquitous albums of the 1970s. The Eagles made music incorporating blues and country rock, which was full of certain illnesses in Southern California after the hippies and before the punk era.
Half a century after its release in 1976, the “Hotel California” album and Henry’s Genome Thoughts, “You can always check out, but you can never leave,” have become endless. Speculation Among the fans about the meaning of the lyrics. The band’s ongoing world tour of playing the album back and forth in a full orchestra has filled the arena for over two years.
According to a news release from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Horowitz obtained Henry’s memo in 2005. The manuscript was originally stolen from a songwriter in the late 1970s by a writer working on a book about the band, Release said. The notes include handwritten lyrics to the album’s title track, “Hotel California.”
Henry noticed a reproduction of the notebook when Horowitz sold it to fellow collectors Insialdi and Kocinski who tried to sell the notebook further. According to the district attorney, Mr Henry submitted a police report telling collectors that the memo had been stolen.
“Defendants responded by engaging in years of campaigns to prevent Henry from recovering the manuscript, rather than striving to ensure that they actually have legitimate ownership. “I did,” said the district attorney’s release.
According to the District Attorney’s Office, the men tried to clean the notes through the Sotheby’s auction house and made a five-year effort to hide where the document came from. According to a news release, Horowitz later sought to take full advantage of the 2016 death of other Eagles frontman Glenn Frey, suggesting that Frey was the first source of information for the treatise.
“Alas, dead, and by identifying him as the source, this will be completely gone,” Frey said, after a memo was confiscated by investigators from Sotheby’s warehouse, district, Horowitz said. Said the law firm in a forged statement.
Mr. Horowitz was charged with conspiracy, attempts to possess a criminal possession of stolen property, and obstruction of prosecution. Inciardi and Kosinski were charged with possessing stolen property and plots.
Alex Traub When Jennifer Schusler Report that contributed.