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Alan Callan is a businessman, musician, and filmmaker.

Callan first met Jimmy Page in 1968, the year that Led Zeppelin was formed. Callan was pursuing a career in the arts producing short films, writing, and photography. All of these pursuits were combined with a lifelong passion for music. He and Page became friends at a screening of the film San Francisco which Callan produced with documentary director Anthony Stern. The film went on to win several film festival awards in Europe.

Some time later, Page asked Peter Grant to contact Callan and offer him Led Zeppelin's music for any future projects. Around this time, Callan had given up playing drums and begun playing guitar where he quickly extended his involvement in music by playing with a succession of small bands. Eventually, through the support of Chris Blackwell (owner of Island Records), Callan got time at Basing Street Studios and learned the rudiments of record production. Alan never made a film using Zeppelin material, but his growing involvement in the U.K music scene as a player/producer allowed him to run Swan Song Records.

While running Swan Song, he oversaw several releases on the label and was behind the efforts to sign John Lennon and Vangelis. Independently of his work at Swan Song, Callan produced a wide range of music by artists that included Alexis Korner, Paul Carrack, Back Street Crawler, Murray Head and Bob Weston.

Since Swan Song, Alan went on to develop the international media company CPMA Group. He used his entertainment skills to build a portfolio of media-based sports rights that today have become some of the worlds most watched properties. Callan has directed and/or promoted The European PGA Championship, The Scottish Open Golf Championship (which he founded), the Rugby World Cup, the 1993 World Chess Championship, and the PGA European Tour.

In 2000, Callan was forced to stop work due to multiple myeloma. In May of that year, he resigned as Chairman and CEO of Worldsport Networks, telling staff that his condition was terminal. Despite investing in the company during his treatment, June staff salaries at the company were delayed, and the first redundancies were announced in July, these employees were never fully remunerated for their two months of loyalty. The company closed in September.

Following extensive treatment at the Mayo Clinic Callan is in remission.

Nearly forty years on, he is still good friends with Jimmy Page. Callan also is involved in developing advanced systems for distributing digital content via satellites.

• Callan's eulogy for Peter Grant Proximity Led Zeppelin fanzine.
• What did you do during the boom, daddy? worldsport.com
• People were walking out with iMacs' The real story of how Worldsport became a dot.bomb