International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival

The International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival was founded in 1994 by Ian Smith and his son Neil and is held every summer in England. The two- or three-week Festival of Gilbert and Sullivan performances and fringe events attracts thousands of visitors, including performers, supporters, and G&S enthusiasts from all around the world. Beginning in 2014, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, hosts the festival, which was held in Buxton, Derbyshire, from 1994 to 2013.

At the festival, about a dozen amateur Gilbert and Sullivan performing societies from around the world compete on the festival's main stage each year for awards including "International Champion". At the weekends there are professional Gilbert and Sullivan performances, including performances each year by the festival's homegrown National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company. A smaller nearby theatre and other venues host the festival fringe, which consists of dozens of performances, lectures, a memorabilia fair, and other events.

The festival was founded in 1994 and continues to be produced by Ian Smith and his son Neil to enhance the knowledge, understanding and appreciation of the works of Gilbert and Sullivan. It also has a goal of reinstating G&S and the performing arts in schools in Britain. Occasionally, the festival has added a week of performances in the United States. Ian Smith believes that the Gilbert and Sullivan works are an important national heritage and legacy, especially as performed in the tradition of the venerable, year-round D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, which performed Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy Operas continuously, year-round, for over a century until 1982. When that company closed in 1982, greatly diminishing the amount of Gilbert and Sullivan produced in Britain, Ian Smith "had a burning anger" that the English Arts Council had not subsidised the company, and this led him to found the festival.

Each summer, beginning with the last weekend in July or first weekend in August, the festival has included three weeks of nightly G&S operas (and weekend matinees) and dozens of daytime fringe activities, although its length was reduced to two and a half weeks beginning in 2016 and just over two weeks in 2016. The festival was held in Buxton, England, every year from 1994 to 2013, but it has experimented with additional weeks of the festival in other towns or cities, including Eastbourne, England once, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania twice, Berkeley, California once and Gettysburg, Pennsylvania twice. The festival relocated to Harrogate in 2014 and is scheduled to remain there at least to 2018. The festival has sold more than 25,000 tickets in some years and attracts up to 2,000 performers each year.

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