In the summer of 1903, Paliashvili and A.S. Khakhashvili (Khakhanov), professor at the University of Moscow and specialist in the history of Georgian literature, made a tour of Svanetia (a high-altitude area in western Georgia), where they recorded some rare old Georgian folk songs. Paliashvili described the trip to his favourite teacher, S.I. Taneyev. in 1903–1908 with the same goal in view Paliashvili toured such districts as Racha, where he recorded local folk singers, and in particular a mestvire (Bag-piper); Guria (Ozurgeti), Imereti, Kartli and Kakheti. Some of the songs recorded by Paliashvili were published in Moscow as a collection in 1910, financed by the Georgian Philarmonic Society. These are Forty Georgian Folk Songs recorded by Z. Paliashvili and Eight Folk songs rendered for choir and orchestra. Paliashvili, however, did not rest content. Whenever he had the least opportunity, he included folk songs elaborated by him in the concert programme of his choirs. Kliment Kvitka, Ukrainian musicologist and ethnographer, and the husband of Lesya Ukrainka, a distinguished Ukrainian poet, sang in one of these choirs. Paliashvili was a good friend of this talented daughter of the Ukrainian people and of her husband till Lesya Ukraininka's death.