Alexander Scriabin
Scriabin was educated in the Moscow Cadet Corps. He learned to play the piano and became friends with the composer Sergei Rachmaninoff who was just one year younger. He won the second gold medal ever to be awarded at the Moscow Conservatoire (Rachmaninoff had won the first one). He practised a piece called Islamey by Balakirev but damaged his right hand doing it. He still managed to continue his career as a pianist, but he wrote a few piano pieces for the left hand only. In 1895 he toured through many countries in Europe giving concerts and composing a lot of piano music. He married in 1897. He went with his wife to Odessa where he played his Piano Concerto and then spent several months in Paris. He taught at the Moscow Conservatoire and wrote some important orchestral music. Later he left his wife and children and went to Europe for several years with another woman. She inspired a lot of his music. Scriabin continued to travel and play the piano until the end of his life. When he was in London in 1914 he had a boil on his lip, which got steadily worse until he died a year later.