He was one of the singer-songwriters and guitarists with Melbourne-based rock band the Sports from August 1978 to late 1981, which had Top 30 hits on the Kent Music Report Singles Chart with, "Don't Throw Stones" (1979), "Strangers on a Train" (1980) and "How Come" (1981); and Top 20 albums with Don't Throw Stones (No.

Armiger was musical director for Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) TV 1984 series Sweet and Sour and was record producer on the related soundtrack album as well as performing and songwriting.

At the Australian Film Institute Awards of 1986 he shared an accolade for Best Original Music Score with William Motzing for their work on Young Einstein (publicly released 1988).

At the age of eight he gave up on his violin lessons, turned away from his mother's taste in classical music and his father's favourites of Peggy Lee and Perry Como – he had discovered Buddy Holly's "Brown Eyed Handsome Man".

In August 1977 the group broke up but left enough material for a posthumous album, What Happened!, which appeared in the following year on Missing Link Records.

[15] According to music journalist Ian McFarlane, Cummings had ousted Bates in favour of Armiger who had a "more commercial outlook".

[15] Luis Feliu of The Canberra Times described Bates: "[he] shows an authentic feel for the early strains of rock and roll", whereas Armiger "brings with him a more electric sound".

[18] For the Don't Throw Stones album Feliu noted that Armiger "has now established himself as a dominating sound and songwriter with the band", specifically his "songs sees the Sports getting into a sort of heavier, Skyhooks type approach".

[21] The authors, John O'Donnell, Toby Creswell and Craig Mathieson, described how Armiger had affected the group's sound, saying that "it is immediately clear the extra dimension his presence brings to the band – his songs – and harmony vocals greatly increase [the group's] soul pop quotient".

[22] He described working with Cameron Allan, their producer on Sondra, to Susan Moore of The Australian Women's Weekly: "we knew we could badger him to get what we wanted, if need be.

[23] The Sports broke up late in 1981 and Cummings went on to a solo career, while Armiger turned to record producing and session work.

[10] As a session musician, by November 1980, he supplied lead guitar for Marc Hunter's solo album, Big City Talk.

[24] In 1981 he produced three tracks, "Promise not to Tell", "Lowdown" and "Want You Back", on former High Rise Bombers bandmates, Paul Kelly and the Dots' debut album, Talk, released on Mushroom Records in March.

[25][26] After The Sports had disbanded, in August 1982 Armiger produced an extended play, Club of Rome, and a single, "Ululation (Here It Comes Again)" (September 1983), for The Kevins which included Sally Ford, another former bandmate.

[27][28] In the early 1980s, Armiger moved to New South Wales, he continued to produce records, and expanded his composition and performance of music for films and TV.

[10][18] Neil Lade of The Canberra Times described the single "[it's] quite a dismal and derivative little number that easily falls into the category of throw-away music" while the rest of the album's "overall feeling is of soft soul and a gentle mood prevails".

[33][34][nb 1] Armiger was composer for Come In Spinner, an ABC TV series in 1989, and produced the soundtrack of the same title in 1990, by Vince Jones and Grace Knight, which peaked at No.

[10] His former bandmate, Kelly, provided vocals on the soundtrack together with Vika Bull, Deborah Conway, and Renée Geyer.

[40][41] The Sports reformed for the Mushroom 25 Live anniversary concert on 14 November 1998, at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG),[15] but Armiger was unable to perform due to a previously broken leg turning gangrenous.

[42] During September 2000 Armiger was hospitalised by an infection, in the following January he recalled his experience in an article, "Waiting for Life and Death'", for The Sydney Morning Herald.

Again, in October 2009 Armiger was called as an expert witness for a Federal Court hearing on a plagiarism claim against Colin Hay and Ron Strykert as writers of the 1981 Men at Work hit single "Down Under",[49] which peaked at No.

[49] The High Rise Bombers Armiger credited as producer or co-producer:[10] Armiger credited as music composer or co-composer:[44] Australasian Performing Right Association Awards Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) recognises excellence by composers and songwriters with the APRA Awards presented annually since 1982.