The words are from the poem The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe, very freely translated into Russian by the symbolist poet Konstantin Balmont.
Rachmaninoff wrote to his friend Nikita Morozov in December 1906, asking whether he could think of a suitable subject for a choral piece to follow his cantata Spring.
[6] The Bells is scored for soprano, tenor, and baritone soloists, mixed choir, and an orchestra of piccolo, 3 flutes, 3 oboes, cor anglais, 3 clarinets, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, contrabassoon, 6 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, 4 tubular bells, glockenspiel, triangle, tambourine, snare drum, cymbals, bass drum, tamtam, upright piano, celesta, harp, organ (ad lib), and the standard strings of I & II violins, violas, cellos, and double basses.
The four movements are marked: Circumstantially and compositionally, The Bells draws parallels between its composer and his former mentor, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
Rachmaninoff was unquestionably aware that the poem was authored by Poe and translated by Balmont, for he made these attributions in a letter to Marietta Shaginyan announcing the completion of the work.