Boris Godunov (opera) cut, including the additional removal of the Kromï scene, likely for political reasons (starting 20 October 1876, the 13th performance). After protracted difficulties in obtaining the production of his opera, Mussorgsky was compliant with Nápravník's demands, and even defended these mutilations to his own supporters. "Boris Godunov" was performed 21 times during the composer's lifetime, and 5 times after his death (in 1881) before being withdrawn from the repertory on 8 November 1882. When Mussorgsky's subsequent opera "Khovanshchina" was rejected for production in 1883, the Imperial Opera Committee reputedly said: "One radical opera by Mussorgsky is enough." "Boris Godunov" did
Wozzeck on the compositional direction of "Wozzeck". In a letter to his wife written in June 1918, he wrote, "There is a little bit of me in his character, since I have been spending these war years just as dependent on people I hate, have been in chains, sick, captive, resigned, in fact, humiliated." His correspondence and notebooks dating from the war years reveal a painful obsession with completing "Wozzeck". Compositional sketches and notes for both Wozzeck and the "" of Three Pieces for Orchestra that Berg made during the war are strewn with disjointed fragments of military ordinances and terminology.