# In 1953, Joni Mitchell heard the song that made her fall in love with music. Now, she calls it “the most beautiful melody ever”

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/in-1953-joni-mitchell-heard-the-song-that-made-her-fall-in-love-with-music-now-she-calls-it-the-most-beautiful-melody-ever/
- Published: 2026-11-08T20:00:00+00:00
- Updated: 2026-11-08T20:24:47+00:00
- Original publisher: Far Out
- Original article: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/1953-joni-mitchell-song-made-her-fall-in-love-with-music/
- Topics: Entertainment, Music

## Key points

- Rachmaninoff’s 18th variation inspired Mitchell’s love of music.
- She listened to it as a child in a record shop booth.
- Rock and roll followed, but the melody stayed with her.

## Summary

Joni Mitchell has said that Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, especially its 18th variation, first made her fall in love with music. She credits the piece’s melody with inspiring her to create music, a formative influence that stayed with her as her interests later expanded to folk and rock and roll.

As a child, Mitchell would visit a record shop where customers could listen to 78 rpm records in a glass booth before buying them. She could not afford the record, but returned to hear the rhapsody; she later called it “the most beautiful melody I ever heard”. In the 1950s, rock and roll became another major influence, but the article says the classical piece remained important to her.

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Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.