in the air

Prepositional phrase

1. (idiomatic) In the surrounding ambience.
   • As soon as we entered we could feel the excitement and tension in the air.
   • You may not know La Baule. Think of it as Bognor Regis. Now, you may have spent half your life there, but I do not believe you ever heard Beethoven playing in the air.2007 November 3, David Thomson, “Music in the air”, in The Guardian
2. (idiomatic) In the generally prevailing feeling, idea, atmosphere, or mood.
   • Polo was nothing if golf were in the air!1902, Robert Marshall Grade, The Haunted Major
   • But capital was proving difficult to raise; rumours were in the air that the G.W.R. and L.S.W.R. were about to patch up their quarrel, and the people of Southampton, who twelve months earlier had staged a torch-light procession to celebrate the passing of the D.N.S.R. Act, were increasingly loath...1955 February, T. B. Sands, “The Didcot, Newbury & Southampton Railway—1”, in Railway Magazine, page 79
3. (idiomatic) Prevalent without traceable origin or authority.
   • There was a rumour about them in the air.
4. (idiomatic) Not in a fixed or stable position; unsettled; up in the air.
5. (idiomatic) Unsupported and liable to be turned or taken in flank.
   • The army had its wing in the air.