Margaret Eliot


Margaret Augusta Eliot was an English music teacher and musician. She was a professor of oboe at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and her best-known student was George Martin; in 2011, just before her death at age 97, she appeared in the documentary film Produced by George Martin. In the early 1960s she also taught Paul McCartney to successfully play the recorder, which he later used to effect, for the recording of "The Fool on the Hill".
Eliot was also an honorary member of the Royal Academy of Music.

Family

Margaret Eliot was born to Hon. Edward Granville Eliot, a younger brother of both 7th and 8th Earls of St Germans, and his wife, Clare Louise. She was a great-granddaughter of Edward Granville Eliot, 3rd Earl of St Germans and Spencer Ponsonby-Fane.
On 27 July 1943, she married Dr Richard Asher ; the couple had three children:
  1. Peter Asher, who was one half of the pop duo Peter & Gordon and successful music producer;
  2. Jane Asher, the film and TV actress, novelist, and former fiancée of Paul McCartney
  3. Clare Asher, the radio actress.