Tantivy Towers is a three-act light opera with music composed by Thomas Frederick Dunhill, and libretto by A. P.
[2] The play ran for six months, later touring England and being staged in Australia and America.
Dunhill, by then in his fifties but still living in London (at 27, Platt's Lane, Hampstead) was widely thought to have succeeded more with the music for the rural set than for the modern Chelsea artistic types, and was criticised for avoiding any hint of jazz in his Chelsea music.
[6] The work is an example of a lyric opera (opéra lyrique) in that it consists of sung verse, with no prose speech; this contrasts with the opéra comique, which does contain spoken dialogue between the musical numbers; both genres include serious (or even tragic) works, and comedies.
The overture has been arranged for orchestra by Philip Lane and recorded by the Royal Ballet Sinfonia, conductor Gavin Sutherland.