Night on Bald Mountain Baron Georgiy Mengden, a military friend of the composer. In 1860 Mussorgsky informed Balakirev that he had been commissioned to write one act of an opera on this subject: However, as with the previous project, it is unknown whether any materials were written down, and, if so, whether they were transferred to subsequent projects. Rimsky-Korsakov declares in his memoirs ("Chronicle of My Musical Life") that in the early 1860s Mussorgsky, under the influence of Franz Liszt's "Totentanz", had written a version of the "Bald Mountain" music for piano and orchestra. However, it is believed that Mussorgsky did not hear Liszt's
High on the Mountain Top High on the Mountain Top "High on the Mountain Top" is an 1850s hymn written by Latter Day Saint hymn writers Joel H. Johnson and Ebenezer Beesley. Originally named "Deseret", it is hymn number 5 in the current LDS Church hymnal. The lyrics to the hymn were written by Johnson in 1853, five years after Brigham Young preached on Ensign Peak as the Mormon pioneers first arrived in the Salt Lake Valley. Even though Johnson's journal contains more than 700 hymns, "High on the Mountain Top" is his most notable contribution to LDS music. In 1854, Beesley composed music to