In June, a chamber opera collaboration between Ed Driver (2016/Class of 2018) and Samir Chadha (2016), as composer and
librettist), and directed by Bill Bankes-Jones (Tête à Tête, Royal Opera, ENO) was given its initial run in the Britten Theatre at the Royal College of Music.

The story of their collaboration began when Ed tuned into University Challege one Monday evening and Samir appeared on his screen as the captain of the Birkbeck team. Ed was struck by Samir announcing on screen that he was undertaking postgraduate study in creative and critical writing - Ed was in the process of pitching a brand-new opera, and earlier that day had made the decision to recruit a librettist. He made contact with Samir, they met to discuss the project and a collaboration had begun.

Despite tough competition and two rounds of interviews, their pitch was deemed worthy and they were awarded the project. The result, titled Airtime, can be described as follows: ‘Airtime offers a magical realist take on Paris’s early-20th-century pneumatic clock network,
following the life of the city’s most regular breather. All day, every day, Philippe N. du Lum’s remarkably consistent respiration regulates the network. His wife, fed up with his excruciatingly predictable lifestyle, leaves him, causing him to panic and hyperventilate. He meditates to try and slow things down again, before losing it once again. This respirational irregularity is responsible for contractions and dilations of time, which have catastrophic consequences for everyday life across the city. Throughout the opera, we see these consequences through the lens of a Parisian radio station, where Pierre, Philippe’s brother, works as the chief executive. The acceleration of time means that Pierre has insufficient time to arrange for a deputy to conduct the radio orchestra, forcing Philippe, with his exceedingly good sense of time, to stand in.’.

It is a wonderful example of the Tiffin community that more than 7 years after leaving Tiffin, having not spoken to one another since, their time as Tiffinians has produced such an incredible result.