Who we are
Adrian Brooks, Founder
Adrian is responsible for founding both Litestructures in 1990, the LS-Live rehearsal studio in 2005 and BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® in 2009.
Originally qualified as a teacher in Manchester, Adrian cut his teeth with Access Equipment Ltd., the company responsible for pioneering quick assembly aluminium tower structures for the scaffolding industry in the '70s. He went on to become a founding member of Astralloy, a specialist manufacturer of aluminium products. It was whilst working at this company that Adrian and a fellow colleague invented Astralite, the first system of its type in the world. It soon became clear that the new generation of aluminium structures, aimed at the entertainment, leisure, retail and architectural markets would provide the way forward.
Litestructures built on the reputation of Astralite and several notable ‘firsts’ have emerged from the Litestructures stable; industry standard staging system Litedeck, Astralive which was the first system to incorporate live tracking to carry mains power and the purpose-built rehearsal arena LS-Live, used by many touring bands for production test-runs.
Adrian has a dream to establish the Wakefield facility as a quality provider of not only stage sets and aluminium structures but also a world class rehearsal, TV and film studios. Sixty years ago Pinewood wasn’t famous for film making; everything starts somewhere.
With a desire to give something back to the industry for future generations, Adrian founded BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® with Robin Watkinson and Kelly Craven in 2009.
John Botham OBE, Chairman
Independent Education Technology Consultant and former Head Teacher, our Chairman John Botham has over 40 years experience working within education and the education technology market.
Honoured in 1997 for his ‘Services to Education’ in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours List, John held a number of important posts within education, including his role as Head Teacher of Greenwood Junior School in Nottingham, Director of Education for Sheffield Education Action Zone and as an Advisor to the Government.
Significant roles within the education technology market include his position as Chairman ABK Computers, Director of Education Riverdeep Software and Director of Education for Apple Computers UK, where he was responsible for technology training and sales solutions for the UK education sector and Director of Education for Advocacy Apple Europe, where his remit was to devise and present education solutions to high level European leaders.
Much sought after on the conference circuit, John has presented at the BETT educational technology show in London, The Global Education Forum in Dubai and the Ministry of Education Conference in Bahrain. He has also been commissioned to advise Education Ministries across the globe about their ICT requirements and solutions, including to name but a few, the Ministry of Education in Bahrain, UAE and Nordrhein-Westfalen State Ministry of Education in Germany.
Robin Watkinson, COO and FdA Course Leader
Since starting in the industry in 1985, Robin has worked on a huge range of varied projects, from live concerts and theatre productions to trade and product launches, fashion shows and TV. He came to specialise in open air and heritage site events, having been Technical Manager for the Gawsworth Hall open air theatre season for many years. Apart from event planning he undertook lighting, sound and stage design, temporary power installation, licensing, noise control and show operation. He was also Theatre and Production Manager for Bretton Hall and Leeds University from 2000 - 2008 and was responsible for the specification and commissioning of their new £5 million theatre complex in 2008. Robin also has experience of teaching both BTEC and Degree level specialisms in lighting, CAD, sound and events planning.
David Kirtlan, Apple Distinguished Educator
MMus, BA (Hons), ALCM, PGCE
David is an experienced education consultant working with large organisations and academic institutions throughout the UK and Europe. Following 11 years of working in both the creative industries and education, and managing a large provision within a UK further education college for seven years, he has substantial experience of working with young people and teaching staff across all levels of education, providing workshops and staff development sessions on innovation and creativity within the classroom. David’s experience and skill has been recognised by Apple who have given him the accolade of being an ‘Apple Distinguished Educator’, and more recently, an ‘Apple Education Mentor’.
Sara Gleadhall, Sales and Business Development Manager
Sara has enjoyed a successful career in the music and live events industry for over 12 years, both in freelance production work and as Operation Manager for The Music Factory Entertainment Group in South Yorkshire. In the latter role she was responsible for all event, sales and marketing activity for a portfolio of brands in the music and fitness sectors, including Tidy, Mastermix and Pure Energy. Sara joined BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® in February 2012. Outside her full-time role, Sara pursues her passion for working in live events, fulfilling various roles at some of the UK’s biggest events. Her portfolio includes working with The BBC, Radio One, Artist Needs Ltd and Live Nation in everything from artist liaison and tour management, to travel logistics and stage management.
Rory Perrett, CEO
Rory has held senior posts in the education and business development sectors over the past 20 years. He is currently the Chief Executive of BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® as well as a Director of Community Partnership Solutions, a business focused on developing corporate social responsibility strategies for companies. Working in both Higher and Further Education, Rory has been responsible for developing and delivering a significant number of business education development partnerships responsible for a wide range of business improvements through innovation and knowledge application.
While working at Lincoln University, Rory managed the creation of the University’s Student Business Incubator, Sparkhouse Studios. Recently he has continued this type of work as the Managing Director of Doncaster Business Innovation Centre. This work with entrepreneurs and business start-ups includes an interest in, and experience of, social enterprise and economic and social regeneration.
Rachel Esson, PR and Marketing Manager
Rachel joined BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® in March 2011 and also fulfills the same role for LS-Live, juggling her time between the two. She studied a Journalism Masters at The University of Sheffield and spent five years at a publishing company editing trade magazines for both the late night entertainment industry and the live events production industry. She also built a portfolio doing freelance journalism and PR for businesses.
Whilst editing live event production trade title TPi Magazine, she set up a platform for the voice of young talent by developing the 'My Generation' aspect of the magazine.
Kate White, Sales and Admin Assistant
Kate joined BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® in December 2011 and she'll be the first face you see on arrival at the premises. She studied Advertising and Media Relations at The University of Huddersfield, focusing on Public Relations, Consumer Behaviour and Events Management.
Whilst studying, she began planning and promoting Private Rented Sector exhibition style events, which she continued to manage following graduation. Prior to university she worked in telesales, customer service and recruitment resourcing.
Gareth Welbourne, Technical Director
Gareth combines his full-time role as Technical Director at BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® with freelance work as a technician in live events and theatre. He studied an HND in Electrical Mechanical Engineering at Oldham College, passing his spare time working at local concerts and venues as crew.
After a short spell of working in alarms systems, he joined Doncaster College’s theatre department, working his way up to Senior Technician where he was responsible for looking after the operations and maintenance of their theatre spaces, recording studio, bookable equipment and their network of 200 Apple Macs. Whilst at Doncaster College, he carried on working freelance as a Technician for a range of companies doing complete AV installations, large concerts and festivals.
After a month travelling around Australia Gareth decided there was more to life than working in a college and made the jump to BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® as Technical Director and has never looked back!
Mark Tucknott, Finance Director
Mark went to Nottingham University in 2000 and joined Deloitte's Nottingham office as a graduate where he worked in the Audit department for three years, qualifying as a chartered accountant. He returned 'home' to Yorkshire in 2006 where he transferred to Deloitte's Corporate Finance team in Leeds, specialising in advising companies and their lenders on how to improve the financial performance of their businesses. During this time he became a qualified Insolvency Practitioner in 2009 and spent 12 months on secondment to Barclays in 2010, before joining BACKSTAGE ACADEMY® and LS-Live in his current role in October 2011.
Kelly Craven, Operations Director
Kelly is one of the founding members of BACKSTAGE ACADEMY®. She studied Performance Design at Bretton Hall, specialising in lighting design and programming. She took part in numerous performances incorporating emergent technologies and organised an 'emergent technologies' conference in 2008.
She went on to assist with the commissioning of the new theatre in Leeds City Centre and worked as a theatre events assistant helping to produce many of the school's and societies' shows as well as a two week opening festival of touring productions.
Kelly was course leader for the BTEC National Diploma in Production Arts at York College, teaching lighting and stage management, as well as overseeing the assessments for all other modules on the course.