"Beethoven and Beatles, Mozart and Michael Jackson, Paganini and Prince - I like them all"
About this Quote
The specific intent is pragmatic and strategic. Vanessa-Mae built her career by pushing the violin into arenas that typically don’t make room for it: crossover albums, glossy production, stadium-size hooks. Saying “I like them all” isn’t a shrug; it’s a refusal to audition for anyone’s approval. It signals to classical purists that she knows the lineage (Beethoven, Mozart, Paganini) and to pop audiences that she’s fluent in their pantheon (Beatles, MJ, Prince). It’s also a defense against the predictable accusation that crossover is a dilution. Instead, she frames it as abundance.
Subtextually, it’s a thesis about virtuosity. Paganini and Prince aren’t random: both are mythologized technicians, showmen whose skill becomes spectacle. In the late-20th/early-2000s culture of genre-mashing and MTV polish, this line works because it treats “seriousness” as an energy, not a category. The list is a passport stamped by multiple worlds, and the final clause turns it into a permission slip: you can, too.
Quote Details
| Topic | Music |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Mae, Vanessa. (2026, January 16). Beethoven and Beatles, Mozart and Michael Jackson, Paganini and Prince - I like them all. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/beethoven-and-beatles-mozart-and-michael-jackson-129660/
Chicago Style
Mae, Vanessa. "Beethoven and Beatles, Mozart and Michael Jackson, Paganini and Prince - I like them all." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/beethoven-and-beatles-mozart-and-michael-jackson-129660/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Beethoven and Beatles, Mozart and Michael Jackson, Paganini and Prince - I like them all." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/beethoven-and-beatles-mozart-and-michael-jackson-129660/. Accessed 9 Feb. 2026.





