Before there was musical theater as we know it today, there was Gilbert and Sullivan — the Victorian-era collaborators who churned out comedic operas like hotcakes in the late 19th-century. Youth Opera Company’s fall workshop performance, Gilbert & Sullivan Operettas, pays homage to the influential theatrical partnership by weaving in scenes from their most popular works, such as Iolanthe, Patience and The Mikado. Using a clever script by guest stage director Erik Kroncke, talented teen singers take on roles of podcast hosts locked in the eternal artistic debate: What’s more important — music or text?