Editing Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (section)

===Increasing conservatism; second creative drought===
[[File:Nikolai A. Rimsky-Korsakov.jpg|left|thumb|240x240px|Rimsky-Korsakov (before 1908)]]
In March 1889, Angelo Neumann's traveling "[[Richard Wagner]] Theater" visited Saint Petersburg, giving four cycles of ''[[Der Ring des Nibelungen]]'' there under the direction of [[Karl Muck]].<ref name="abng1630"/> The Five had ignored Wagner's music, but ''The Ring'' impressed Rimsky-Korsakov:<ref>Maes, pp. 176–177.</ref> he was astonished with Wagner's mastery of orchestration. He attended the rehearsals with Glazunov, and followed the score. After hearing these performances, Rimsky-Korsakov devoted himself almost exclusively to composing operas for the rest of his creative life. Wagner's use of the orchestra influenced Rimsky-Korsakov's orchestration,<ref name="abng1630">Abraham, ''New Grove (1980)'', 16:30.</ref> beginning with the arrangement of the [[polonaise (dance)|polonaise]] from Mussorgsky's ''Boris Godunov'' that he made for concert use in 1889.<ref>Rimsky-Korsakov, ''My Musical Life'', p. 298.</ref>

Toward music more adventurous than Wagner's, especially that of [[Richard Strauss]] and later [[Claude Debussy]], Rimsky-Korsakov's mind remained closed. He would fume for days afterwards when he heard pianist [[Felix Blumenfeld]] play Debussy's ''[[Estampes]]'' and write in his diary about them, "Poor and skimpy to the nth degree; there is no technique, even less imagination."<ref>As quoted in Taruskin, ''Stravinsky'', p. 55.</ref> This was part of an increasing musical conservatism on his part (his "musical conscience", as he put it), under which he now scrutinized his music and that of others as well.<ref name="maes180"/> Compositions by his former compatriots in The Five were not immune. While working on his first revision of Mussorgsky's ''Boris Godunov'', in 1895 he would tell his [[amanuensis]], Vasily Yastrebtsev, "It's incredible that I ever could have liked this music and yet it seems there was such a time."<ref>As quoted in Taruskin, ''Stravinsky'', p. 40.</ref> By 1901 he would write of growing "indignant at all [of Wagner's] blunders of the ear"—this about the same music which caught his attention in 1889.<ref name="Maes181">Maes, p. 181.</ref>

In 1892, Rimsky-Korsakov suffered a second creative drought,<ref name="maes171"/> brought on by bouts of depression and alarming physical symptoms. Rushes of blood to the head, confusion, memory loss and unpleasant obsessions<ref name="abraham31">Abraham, ''New Grove'', 16:31.</ref> led to a medical diagnosis of [[neurasthenia]].<ref name="abraham31"/> Crises in the Rimsky-Korsakov household may have been a factor—the serious illnesses of his wife and one of his sons from [[diphtheria]] in 1890, the deaths of his mother and youngest child, as well as the onset of the prolonged, ultimately fatal illness of his second youngest child. He resigned from the Russian Symphony Concerts and the Court Chapel<ref name="abraham31"/> and considered giving up composition permanently.<ref name="maes171">Maes, p. 171.</ref> After making third versions of the musical tableau ''Sadko'' and the opera ''The Maid of Pskov'', he closed his musical account with the past; he had left none of his major works before ''May Night'' in their original form.<ref name="abng1630"/>

Another death brought about a creative renewal.<ref name="abraham31"/> The passing of Tchaikovsky presented a twofold opportunity—to write for the Imperial Theaters and to compose an opera based on Nikolai Gogol's short story ''[[Christmas Eve (Gogol)|Christmas Eve]]'', a work on which Tchaikovsky had based his opera ''[[Vakula the Smith]]''. The success of Rimsky-Korsakov's ''[[Christmas Eve (opera)|Christmas Eve]]'' encouraged him to complete an opera approximately every 18 months between 1893 and 1908 — a total of 11 during this period.<ref name="maes171"/> He also started and abandoned another draft of his treatise on orchestration,<ref name="leo149"/> but made a third attempt and almost finished it in the last four years of his life. (His son-in-law [[Maximilian Steinberg]] completed the book in 1912.<ref name="leo149"/>) Rimsky-Korsakov's scientific treatment of orchestration, illustrated with more than 300 examples from his work, set a new standard for texts of its kind.<ref name="leo149">Leonard, p. 149.</ref>