"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."
In 1891 Rimsky-Korsakov, now an artist of standing, the composer of _Snegourotchka_, _Mlada_, and _Shéhérazade_, a master of the orchestral technique he had been teaching for twenty years, returned to his handbook on instrumentation. He would seem to have made notes at different times from 1891 to 1893, during which period, after the first performance of _Mlada_, he gave up composition for a while. These notes, occasionally referred to in his _Memoirs_, are in three volumes of manuscript-paper. They contain the unfinished preface of 1891, a paragraph full of clear, thoughtful writing, and reprinted in this book.[2]
[Footnote 2: This preface had already been published in his _Notes and Articles on Music_ (St. Petersburgh, 1911).]
As the author tells us in his _Memoirs_ (p. 297), the progress of his work was hampered by certain troublesome events which were happening at the time. Dissatisfied with his rough draft, he destroyed the greater part of it, and once more abandoned his task.
In 1894 he composed _The Christmas Night_; this was the beginning of his most fertile period. He became entirely engrossed in composition, making plans for a fresh opera as soon as the one in hand was completed. It was not until 1905 that his thoughts returned to the treatise on orchestration, his musical output remaining in abeyance through no fault of his own. Since 1891 the plan of the work had been entirely remodelled, as proved by the rough drafts still extant. The author had given up the idea of describing different instruments from their technical standpoint, and was more anxious to dwell upon the value of tone qualities and their various combinations.