 Because of this, Rimsky-Korsakov has been accused of pedantry in "correcting", among other things, matters of harmony.Rimsky-Korsakov may have foreseen questions over his efforts when he wrote,

If Mussorgsky's compositions are destined to live unfaded for fifty years after their author's death (when all his works will become the property of any and every publisher), such an archeologically accurate edition will always be possible, as the manuscripts went to the Public Library on leaving me.For the present, though, there was need of an edition for performances, for practical artistic purposes, for making his colossal talent known, and not for the mere studying of his personality and artistic sins.