I read geography at Exeter: BA from 1971-1974, PhD from 1974 to 1978. My particular interest was in why/how people use semantic space – aka language – to evaluate how townscapes affect them.
I then put all my energies into becoming an opera singer.
Very few people manage to be fully employed in the performing arts so I juggled two careers for most of my working life, namely opera and offender learning. My singing has taken me around the world, chiefly playing rather silly old men who should know better, but coming back to working in prisons in the ‘gaps’ was probably very grounding.
My advice is to follow your desires. The only certainty in life – apart from death and taxes – is that if you give up, you definitely won’t succeed at what you really want to do.
•Delivering complex international projects across music, theatre, corporate, and broadcast environments, coordinating logistics, labour, equipment, and suppliers across multiple countries.
•Ownership of project budgets, overseeing forecasting, cost control, labour planning, and material procurement to ensure projects are delivered on time and within budget.
•Act as the operational lead between sales, clients, suppliers, and internal teams, translating creative briefs into structured, deliverable operational plans.
•Provide operational solutions to logistical, geographical, and budgetary challenges in fast-changing, high-pressure environments.
•Build and maintain strong supplier and partner relationships to maximise value, manage risk, and maintain delivery standards at scale.
SIMON BALCON graduated from Exeter university in 1997 with an Honours Degree in English, Drama and Education, having studied at the St Lukes campus. he qualified as a teacxher, but his passion was always for acting.
He subsequently trained at Drama Studio London and the Actors Temple. His theatre credits include Demetrius in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Antonio in Twelfth Night (Cambridge Shakespeare Company), Mercutio in Romeo & Juliet (Tower of London), Don Pedro in Much Ado About Nothing (Illyria Theatre) and Reynaldo and Francisco in Hamlet (Actors Temple Company). He has toured nationally with Ape Theatre’s Too Much Punch for Judy and The House on Cold Hill (Number One Tour). He appeared as Gethin Price in Comedians (Chelsea Theatre), which he also co-produced, Kulygin in Three Sisters (Cockpit Theatre), Him in Poison (Actors East) , Greg in The Other Half, a self-devised collective piece in London, and James in Peckham: The Soap Opera (Royal Court). Throughout lockdown he played roles such as Benedick, Malvolio and the Earl of Warwick in a number of cue script performances for Shakes-Scene Shakespeare. TV credits include Grantchester (Kudos/ITV) and The Nevers (HBO/Mutant Enemy). Film credits include Requiem (NFTS) and Young Woman and the Sea (Disney).