November 6, 1893: Pyotr Ilich Tchiakovsky Dies

November 6, 1893: Pyotr Ilich Tchiakovsky dies in St. Petersburg, Russia, 9 days after conducting the premiere of his Symphony No. 6 in B minor, the Pathétique, there.

He was 53 years old, and the cause is in dispute. There was a cholera outbreak, and he may have drunk tainted water. Whether this was an accident or suicide is also unsure. He was also a prodigious consumer of tobacco and alcohol.

He was known as a piano maestro, and his Piano Concerto No. 1, premiered in 1875, is one of the most famous pieces ever composed for the instrument. In 1882, he composed The 1812 Overture, still one of the most familiar pieces of classical music. And less than a year earlier, The Nutcracker had premiered in St. Petersburg on December 18, 1892. It remains one of the most famous ballets ever written, and, because of its Christmastime setting, its Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy has become one of the most familiar pieces of Christmas music.

But he never seemed to find happiness. His surviving letters contain admissions that he was homosexual, and had entered into a marriage of convenience in 1877 with Antonina Miliukova. She turned out to be a nymphomaniac, and more of an embarrassment to him than his own sexual proclivities. They lived together for less than 3 months.

Given his death so soon after the 6th Symphony premiered, some music historians have suggested that its downcast nature made it a "suicide note." 

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November 6, 1893 was a Monday. Baseball season was over. Hockey was still all-amateur. And basketball had barely been invented. But there was one score on this tragic, historic day: For the 1st time, Pennsylvania State University and the Western University of Pennsylvania -- the schools that would become known as Penn State and the University of Pittsburgh -- played each other in football. Penn State won, 32-0 at Beaver Field in State College -- not to be confused with their home since 1960, Beaver Stadium.