Mussorgsky, Modest Petrovich: see Moussorgsky.

Moussorgsky, Modest Petrovich, 1839-81, Russian composer. His name is also transliterated as Mussorgsky and Musorgsky. He was one of the first to promote a national Russian style. A member of the minor aristocracy and an officer in the Imperial Guard until 1858, he was later a government clerk. His study with Mili Balakirev and his associations with other composers encouraged him to become a composer himself, although his musical training was sketchy and never satisfied him. His masterpiece is the opera Boris Godunov (1868-69, revised 1871-72, produced St. Petersburg, 1874), in which he successfully combined realism and lyricism. Other important works are the opera Khovanshchina (1886); the piano suite Pictures at an Exhibition (1874), later orchestrated by Maurice Ravel; A Night on Bald Mountain (1867), for orchestra; and many songs and three song cycles.

Moussorgsky succumbed to alcoholism in a Saint Petersburg hospital at the age of 41. Most of his music was edited and revised after his death by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov and others, often to such an extent that the originals were seriously misrepresented. Moussorgsky made much use of Russian folk songs, and his settings of Russian texts are unexcelled. Expression and communication were paramount for him; form, inconsequential. In working out a Russian idiom, his rejection of many European standards and practices influenced not only Russian composers but also Claude Debussy and other French composers.

(born March 21, 1839, Karevo, Russia—died March 28, 1881, St. Petersburg) Russian composer. Composing without training in his teens, he met several of the composers with whom he later made up The Five, a group with the common goal of creating a nationalist school of Russian music. He received his first composition lessons from Mily Balakirev in 1857; he soon resigned from his military regiment to devote himself to music. He held a series of government jobs, but his worsening alcoholism eventually made him unemployable. His personal decline was accompanied by maturity as a composer, and he wrote his major works, including the symphonic poem Night on Bald Mountain (1867), the great opera Boris Godunov (1868), and the famous piano cycle Pictures at an Exhibition (1874). His 65 songs describe vivid scenes of Russian life and realistically reproduce the inflections of the spoken Russian language. After Mussorgsky's death, his works were published in drastically edited form, purged of their distinctive starkness and unorthodox harmonies; the original versions were made available in 1928.

Learn more about Mussorgsky, Modest (Petrovich) with a free trial on Britannica.com.

(born March 21, 1839, Karevo, Russia—died March 28, 1881, St. Petersburg) Russian composer. Composing without training in his teens, he met several of the composers with whom he later made up The Five, a group with the common goal of creating a nationalist school of Russian music. He received his first composition lessons from Mily Balakirev in 1857; he soon resigned from his military regiment to devote himself to music. He held a series of government jobs, but his worsening alcoholism eventually made him unemployable. His personal decline was accompanied by maturity as a composer, and he wrote his major works, including the symphonic poem Night on Bald Mountain (1867), the great opera Boris Godunov (1868), and the famous piano cycle Pictures at an Exhibition (1874). His 65 songs describe vivid scenes of Russian life and realistically reproduce the inflections of the spoken Russian language. After Mussorgsky's death, his works were published in drastically edited form, purged of their distinctive starkness and unorthodox harmonies; the original versions were made available in 1928.

Learn more about Mussorgsky, Modest (Petrovich) with a free trial on Britannica.com.