Alison Balsom

Balsom was born in Hertfordshire. She attended Tannery Drift Primary School, then the Greneway Middle School and the Meridian School, all in Royston, Hertfordshire, where she played in a brass band, the Royston Town Band. She took her A-levels at Hills Road Sixth Form College in Cambridge. She studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, the Conservatoire de Paris, and also with Håkan Hardenberger.