BBC Look North presenter Harry Gration launched Skipton Choral Society’s new Sponsors Patrons and Friends Scheme at a recent concert at Bolton Priory.

The aim of the scheme is to enable the choir and its audience to form a closer and deeper connection with one another, while also contributing to the financial strength and stability of the choir.

Mr Gration, who is a vice-president of the society, quoted a message from the society’s president, the Duke of Devonshire: “As president of Skipton Choral Society, it gives me great pleasure to welcome the new Sponsors, Patrons and Friends Scheme, and to wish the choir every success with this excellent initiative.

“In these days of uncertainty, we all need inspiration, beauty and joy in our lives, and few things provide these as richly as choral music. I hope the people of Skipton and the Dales will give the choir the support it deserves.”

A spokesman for the Skipton choir said that despite Yorkshire’s place at the heart of the tradition of choral music in England, there was no permanent choir in Skipton until as recently as 2013.

In that year Ben Crick, founder and conductor of the Skipton Camerata orchestra, decided to celebrate the orchestra’s tenth anniversary by putting on a performance of Haydn's oratorio The Creation.

For this he obviously needed a choir, so he created one from scratch.

The singers enjoyed the experience so much that they came together again for An Evening at the Opera, as a highlight of Skipton’s hosting of Yorkshire Week later in 2013.

That led to the establishment of the choir as a regular choral society, and to more performances of some of the great choral works including Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Bach’s St John Passion, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle and Beethoven’s Choral Symphony.

In early 2015 when it was decided that the combination of orchestra and choir was no longer viable, the choir recreated itself as Skipton Choral Society.

Details of the sponsors scheme are available on the society’s website at skiptonchoralsociety.com/sponsors