Here’s some life advice Ralph Allwood gives to the teenagers who attend his week-long residential Rodolfus Choral Courses, held all through the summer at various schools and colleges across the country. Some of the singers are being pressured by their parents to take just maths and sciences, or other lucrative career-oriented subjects, for A-level or at university, and to give up music.

‘Right,’ he says, as the teenagers assemble for a final rehearsal, ‘this is how you decide what you’re going to do next. Get advice from everyone you can: from your teachers, your parents, the universities, that aunt who wants you to do a sensible subject. Say thank you, then go into your own room and close the door. There, make up your own mind about what you want to do.’

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If Allwood hadn’t done exactly that with the university authorities when he was a ‘determined 19-year-old’, he would not have lived the life he has. And it has been, and continues to be, a richly fulfilling and musically generous life. After being head of music at Pangbourne College and then Uppingham, he was precentor and director of music at Eton for 26 years. Now aged 75 and by no means retired (‘Retired is a silly word’), he directs a handful of top choirs, including the Old Royal Naval College Trinity Laban Choir in Greenwich, south London, and runs the Pimlico Musical Foundation, which he founded ten years ago: an organisation that brings choral singing into the weekly lives of state primary school children in Pimlico.

‘By the skin of my teeth I managed to do A-level music at my grammar school, Tiffin, along with maths and physics. I started reading maths and physics at Durham. A music don spotted some talent when he saw my exposition of a Mozart violin sonata, and asked: “Would you like to change to Honours Music?”’

His parents were supportive of the plan, but his father’s engineer colleague said: ‘Head him off!’ Having taken both sets of advice, Allwood went into his room, decided to take the music path, and ‘from that moment I’ve been consistently happy’.

I visited him in the elegant flat in Pimlico he shares with his husband, the interior designer Alastair Davey. The........

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