Nikolay Andreevich Rimsky Korsakov

Nikolay Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov: A Research and Information Guide, Second Edition is an annotated bibliography of all substantial, relevant published resources relating to the Russian composer. First published in 1988, this revised and expanded volume incorporates new information about the composer appearing over the last two decades, including literary publications, articles and reviews. Other sections provide a brief biographical sketch, selective discography, chronology and list of Rimsky-Korsakov’s works.

Offers a detailed look at the day-to-day life of the Russian composer, and describes his opinions on his work, his colleagues, and other composers and conductors.

A rare look at the life and music of renowned Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov During his lifetime, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844–1908) was a composer whose work had great influence not only in his native Russia but also internationally. While he remains well-known in Russia—where many of his fifteen operas and various orchestral pieces are still in the standard repertoire—very little of his work is performed in the West today beyond Scheherezade and arrangements of The Flight of the Bumblebee. In Western writings, he appears mainly in the context of the Mighty Handful, a group of five Russian composers to which he belonged at the outset of his career. Rimsky-Korsakov and His World finally gives the composer center stage and due attention. In this collection, Rimsky-Korsakov’s major operas, The Snow Maiden, Mozart and Salieri, and The Golden Cockerel, receive multifaceted exploration and are carefully contextualized within the wider Russian culture of the era. The discussion of these operas is accompanied and enriched by the composer’s letters to Nadezhda Zabela, the distinguished soprano for whom he wrote several leading roles. Other essays look at more general aspects of Rimsky-Korsakov’s work and examine his far-reaching legacy as a professor of composition and orchestration, including his impact on his most famous pupil Igor Stravinsky. The contributors are Lidia Ader, Leon Botstein, Emily Frey, Marina Frolova-Walker, Adalyat Issiyeva, Simon Morrison, Anna Nisnevich, Olga Panteleeva, and Yaroslav Timofeev. The Bard Music Festival Bard Music Festival 2018 Rimsky-Korsakov and His World Bard College August 10–12 and August 17–19, 2018

In his "Memoirs of my musical life" the following passage occurs: "I had planned to devote all my energies to the compilation of a full treatise on orchestration. To this end I made several rough copies, jotting down explanatory notes detailing the technique of different instruments. What I intended to present to the world on this subject, was to include everything. The writing of this treatise, or, to be more exact, the sketch for it took up most of my time in the years 1873 and 1874. After reading the works of Tyndall and Helmholtz, I framed an introduction to my work, in which I endeavoured to expound the laws of acoustics as applied to the principles governing the construction of musical instruments. My manual was to begin with a detailed list of instruments, classified in groups and tabulated, including a description of the various systems in use at the present day. I had not yet thought of the second part of the book which was to be devoted to instruments in combination. But I soon realised that I had gone too far. With wind instruments in particular, the different systems were innumerable, and each manufacturer favoured his own pet theory. By the addition of a certain key the maker endowed his instrument with the possibility of a new trill, and made some difficult passages more playable than on an instrument of another kind. "There was no end to such complications. In the brass, I found instruments with three, four, and five valves, the mechanism varying according to the make. Obviously, I could not hope to cover so large a field; besides, of what value would such a treatise be to the student? Such a mass of detailed description of the various systems, their advantages and drawbacks, could not but fail to confuse the reader only too eager to learn. Naturally he would wish to know what instrument to employ, the extent of its capabilities etc., and getting no satisfactory information he would throw my massive work aside. For these reasons my interest in the book gradually waned, and finally I gave up the task."

Principles of Orchestration, with Musical Examples Drawn from His Own Works is a book by a famous Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, member of the group of composers known as The Five. The book presents a notable attempt to show all of the nuances of orchestration. The author describes everything one needs to know about arranging parts for a string or full orchestra. The book is concise, articulate and excels at being both a book of reference and a book of general knowledge.