A touring company bringing the operas of Gilbert & Sullivan to life
In 2025 we celebrate 50 years of the Savs!
Plans include a 50th anniversary production of Ruddigore at the Gilbert & Sullivan Festival in Buxton on Thursday 7 August, and our autumn tour of Iolanthe, the first opera to be staged by the company - dates below
The first public performance by the Savoyards Appreciation Society-West Yorkshire was Iolanthe at the Todmorden Hippodrome, and so, fifty years later, we have chosen Iolanthe as our anniversary touring production. Our first chairman was the late, great Ian Smith who, some 19 years later, had the vision for an internation Gilbert and Sullivan Festival. Members of the Savoyards were instrumental in helping to start and build up the Festival and so it is very appropriate that we have been invited to perform at the 2025 Buxton Gilbert and Sullivan Festival on Thursday 7 August (2.30pm) with our recent acclaimed production of Ruddigore.
Lots of other events are being planned to celebrate 50 years and we invite you to join us on Saturday 15 March at St Peter’s Church, Town St, Rawdon, Leeds LS19 6QL for our 50th anniversary concert, 50 years, almost, to the day that the Savs was formed - tickets on sale now!. Details below.
Our 50th anniversary autumn production will be the operetta we began with half a century ago
Iolanthe
Dates for our autumn 2025 production:
Saturday 6 September 2025, 7.30pm - Penistone Paramount
Saturday 13 September 2025, 7.30pm – Settle Victoria Hall
Saturday 20 September 2025, 7.30pm – Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond
Saturday 27 September 2025, 7.30pm – Bingley Arts Centre
Sunday 5 October 2025, 3pm – Scarborough YMCA Theatre
Thank you to our wonderful audiences across the north for your great support of the 2024 tour, Ruddigore!
Fabulous feedback for Ruddgore:
”Congratulations on staging a truly unforgettable Ruddigore in Settle last night. My wife and I are life-long G&S fans, and attend Buxton for the festival every year. We believe that your company are streets ahead of the rest……. The consistency and quality in last night's lead roles was so impressive that you have now won two new fans who will see you again .. Keep up the good work!”
"Loved the intimacy of the theatre (Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond). It was hard to remember we were not a Georgian audience bent on joining in, heckling, shouting and being rowdy… please go back there next year, I want to go again.”
If you missed the production everyone is talking about, then there is one more chance to see it, at the Gilbert & Sullivan Festival in Buxton on Thursday 7 August 2025
“Wonderful production. Loved it all - singing, direction, choreography, costumes..and marvellous live orchestra.”
“Fantastic production! A brilliant watch. Well done to all involved”
“One of the more bonkers G&S's ( big fan) but I loved the production- traditional but with some tongue in cheek moments”
Find out more about the West Yorkshire Savoyards
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