Gulf sheikh commissions crystal encrusted Steinway
mainLiberace, thy soul goes marching on.
An oil sheikh in the slave state of Qatar has ordered a grand piano, embedded with crystals, from a London firm, Goldfinch Pianos, each crystal inserted separately by hand.
The price? A mere £420,000 ($600,000).
The Qatar economy is built on tenured labour from the Indian subcontinent. The slave workers have their passports confiscated on arrival, are kept in camps outside the city and forced to work in temperatures of up to 50 degrees C. (You won’t hear about this on Qatar-based Al-Jazeera; yes, we’ve seen it, in the company of the late Lorin Maazel).
That’s how Qatar sheikhs get to afford crystal Steinways.
(photos: Goldfinch)
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