n8 RUSSIAN CULTURE
change, which was to play a significant part in the further develop-
ment of the history of Russian music. A. K. Glazunov gave the
following account of this change: "At that time there existed a
fallacy that a free artist had no need to study. Rimsky-Korsakov
did not share this opinion, and when composing PsJ(pvitian%a
he complained bitterly to me that his hands were tied, that his
aspirations were greater than his achievements. This fact weighed
heavily upon him and he decided to learn the technique of com-
position. That necessitated his studying harmony, counterpoint,
and the fugue intently/' particularly as he was offered (1871) the
vacant chair of composition and orchestration at the St. Petersburg
Conservatory. Chaikovsky was profoundly stirred when in 1875
Rimsky-Korsakov sent him some fruits of his exercises in these
"musical artifices," and was only apprehensive that this novice in
technique should become too zealous and develop into a "dull
pedant." Indeed, there is over-abundance of technique in the
Third Symphony (1875), as in a number of other contemporary
works> but a collection of Russian folk songs published by Rimsky-
Korsakov at that same time brought him much nearer the na-
tional source of Russian music. After this he revised all his previous
compositions, and also with renewed ardor applied his knowledge
to composing in a new manner and to the rearrangement of Dar-
gomyzhsky, Borodin, and Musorgsky's unfinished works. May
Night (1878) and especially Snegurock^a (Snow-Maiden, 1880),
which took him only a few months to compose, were exam-
ples of the greatness of his achievements and marked his trans-
formation into a devotee of the Russian folk song. "I am ashamed
to admit that I was jealous," Chaikovsky wrote after hearing
Snegurochfa. At that same period the most perfect of Rimsky-
Korsakov's symphonic compositions, such as Spanish Capriccio,
Shehtrazade, and Easter Sunday also appeared. The last-named
composition was the result of the new position, that of assistant
manager of the Imperial Chapel of Singers, which Rimsky-Korsa-
kov received in 1883 and which led him to study music of the
Orthodox church, thus paving the way for the peerless Legend of
the City of Kitczh. .
Jt is impossible, and not necessary for our purpose, to analyze
Rimsky-Korsakov's creative genius after his musical individuality