Alastair Macgeorge worked for 40 years in the consumer movement – 28 years with Which? and, post-‘retirement’, supporting fledgling groups all over Eastern Europe and Central Asia from 1991 to 2003. These post-Soviet travels yielded a musical bonus in the shape of some truly memorable performances of rare operas in unlikely places. An early starter on the piano but never a great practiser, he infuriated his father, a gifted accompanist, by ‘strumming’ (i.e. playing what came into his four-year-old head). This led to a lifetime of music-making in many contexts – in domestic chamber music, accompanying singers and instrumentalists, and in composition – notably the score for Murder in the Cathedral in St. Michael’s, Highgate, in 1991, and a few songs, choral pieces and other small-scale works. He joined HGO on day one as its rehearsal pianist, and has been deeply involved with its development ever since, latterly as Chairman.