All They Needed Was Love, and Tapes

He was one of the biggest rock stars in the world and she was just a 5-year-old girl as they sat on the floor in 1969, singing and telling stories with a tape recorder running.

Sounds like just a normal family activity, except the man was Beatle John Lennon and the little girl was the stepdaughter he barely knew, Kyoko Cox.

In 1969, fans worried that the Beatles would break up. But instead of attending the last Beatles recording session, Lennon was in Denmark with his second wife, Yoko Ono.

They were there to visit Ono’s ex-husband, Tony Cox, an avant-garde artist. Cox had introduced Lennon and Ono at one of Ono’s art exhibits. “Cox told me that was the worst mistake of his life,” said Chris Lopez, who now owns the tapes.

And he was right. Ono and Lennon fell in love. She divorced Cox, and a bitter custody battle for Kyoko followed.

So it must have been with some trepidation that Lennon and Ono showed up unexpectedly at Cox’s farm in Denmark.

During the next several weeks, Lennon got to know his stepdaughter and made six audiotapes of conversations between them. Lennon sings and plays the guitar and even refers to Ono as the “queen.” And Cox, knowing that those tapes would be of value, kept them until 1995, when he sold them to Lopez, who lives in Denver, saying the price should not be disclosed.

“I was selling my mom’s car and had an ad in the newspaper,” Chris Lopez said, explaining how the two met.

Cox was in Denver at the time. The two became friends and when Cox, who needed money, asked Lopez if he were interested in buying the tapes, Lopez jumped at the chance.

“I knew it was big,” he said.

Six tapes were made; Lopez has sold four. Now, he’s putting the final two -- which run about 45 minutes in all -- up for sale with MastroNet Inc., which auctions high-value collectibles.

He said some of the tapes he sold fetched six figures, but declined to give exact prices or say what he paid for them.

Lopez said he has not listened often to the audiotapes. “There’s an eerie feeling -- a voice from the grave,” he said.

Lennon was shot to death in New York in December 1980.