In the course of his 35-year career as a representative of the British Council, Paul Gotch lived and worked all round the Middle East, making well-regarded films, producing radio broadcasts and becoming well acquainted with people and cultures from Iran and Iraq to the Mediterranean, West Africa and Latin America.

Paul Bevan Gotch was born in 1915. After leaving Shrewsbury school he studied at the London College of Printing and then worked in his uncle’s firm, HMV in Oxford Street, where he had access to his uncle’s fine library of recordings. In 1939 Gotch and his wife, Billy, decided to cycle to Athens. On their first stop in Brussels, he organised a live BBC broadcast of a concert of swing music played by Fud Candrix and his orchestra from the L’Heure Bleue nightclub.

As they cycled south they met Spanish refugees in Marseille, and witnessed the invasion of Albania. On September 3, 1939, the day war was declared on Germany, they arrested and expelled from Bulgaria. Arriving in Athens Gotch joined the British Council and was evacuated to Egypt, where he was appointed director of the Tanta Institute. He made a 16mm film about the British Council at work in Tanta, the first film made to promote the British Council’s philosophy. The film was used in the BBC programme Planet English celebrating 50 years of the British Council.

In 1942 he wrote a book titled Three Caravan Cities and St Catherine’s Monastery which reflected his interest in archaeology. Working with the Egyptian State Broadcasting service, he produced many radio plays with Rex Keating, such as the popular series For the love of Mike, as well as concerts in military hospitals.

Appointed to Alexandria in 1943, Paul and Billy became close friends with Lawrence Durrell and shared the Villa Ambron house for over a year, while Durrell researched The Alexandria Quartet.

British Council appointments to Athens in 1945, Milan in 1947 and then Barcelona gave Gotch many opportunities to pursue his love of jazz and to organise concerts by such visiting US luminaries as Louis Armstrong.

In 1954 Gotch Paul was sent to Accra, Ghana. There he married Marion Grant, his second wife, and produced weekly radio programmes on jazz, and directed his own revue shows, such as Pick me a Paw and The Paludrine Show with enthusiastic involvement by local students. He loved Shakespeare, and his performance in Hamlet was a huge success. He carried on writing songs and playing his guitar all through his life.

His appointment to Shiraz in 1959 enabled him to spend many weekends discovering archaeological sites in the Marv Dasht plain. His work was shown on the BBC programme Chronicle in 1971, which included discoveries of Zoroastrian fire altars.

In 1966 he was posted to Bogotá, and then Lebanon in 1972 — a posting which ended when the civil war erupted in 1975 and all British subjects were evacuated.

He continued to work after retirement, lecturing for Swan Tours all over the Middle East, making archaeology come alive to those who heard his lectures. In his last years he was still active in his local community; in his late eighties he made his last film, with the help of his friends Ted Emblow and Chris Park, about the origins of the River Wye in Buckinghamshire

Gotch is survived by his partner, Jean Coles, and the three children from his first marriage.

Paul Gotch, OBE, British Council representative 1940-75, was born on September 17, 1915. He died on May 17, 2008, aged 92