nature of the Russian people. Rosa Newmarch has called him
the Juvenal of musicians. Second, his national music drama,
Boris Godounoff—dealing with one of the most sensational episodes
in Russian history—which, for the gripping vividness of its de-
scriptions, is quite unparalleled.
“Boris Godounoff, finished in 1870, was performed four years
later in the Imperial Opera House. The libretto of this opera
he took from the poetic drama of Pushkin, but he changed it,
eliminating much and adding new scenes here and there, so that
as a whole it is his own creation. In this work Moussorgsky went
against the foreign classic opera in conception as well as in con-
struction. It is a typically Russian music-drama, with all the
richness of Slavic colors, true Byzantine atmosphere and char-
acters of the medieval ages. Based on Russian history of about
the middle of the seventeenth century, when an adventurous re-
gent ascends the throne and when the court is full of intrigues,
its theme stands apart from all other operas. The music is more
or less, like many of Moussorgsky’s songs, written in imitation
of the old folk-songs, folk dances, ceremonial chants, and festi-
val tunes. Foreign critics have considered the opera as a piece
constructed of folk melodies. But this is not the case. There is
not a single folk melody in Boris Godounoff, every phrase is the
original creation of Moussorgsky."[323]
[Footnote 323: Quoted from theArt of Music, Vol. III.]
In concluding this account of Russian music let the statement
be repeated that only by a thorough knowledge of the life and
character of this strange yet gifted people can their music be
understood. It is necessary therefore to become acquainted
with Russian literature and pictorial art—with the works of
Gogol, Tolstoi and Dostoyevsky and the paintings of Perov and
Veretschagin. In this way only will be made clear what is other-
wise inexplicable—the depth and sincerity of the Russian soul.
The other two prominent national schools in modern times are
the Bohemian and Scandinavian. Although from neither of these
have we products at all comparable in breadth; or depth of
meaning with those of the Russian school, yet each has its note
of exotic individuality and hence deserves recognition. The Bo-
hemian School centres about the achievements of Fibich, Smetana[324]
and Dvo[vr]ák, and its prevalent characteristics are the variety
of dance rhythms (Bohemia having no less than forty national