Evanstonians

Some people think of Manhattan as the centre of U. S. music. But while Manhattanites undoubtedly hear more music than other U. S. citizens, the place where U. S. music seems to be coming from is Evanston, Ill. When the directors of Manhattan's New York Philharmonic-Symphony Society last year established an annual prize of $1,000 for a major symphonic work by a U. S. composer, the prize went to Composer Gardner Read of Evanston.

Last week the Philharmonic-Symphony directors announced the result of their second annual competition. Again the prize went to an Evanston musician: a strapping, blond-whiskered composer named David Van Vactor. A sole honor able mention in the same competition went to Composer Mark Wessel, onetime stu dent and teacher of composition at Evanston's Northwestern University.

Composer Van Vactor, whose Symphony in D won the prize, became a musician by accident because he happened to inherit a flute from an uncle. The village barber of Plymouth, Ind., where his family then lived, taught him how to play it. Soon Flutist Van Vactor was well along on a flute-playing career that wound up in the ranks of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Meanwhile, he studied composition with Composer Wessel at North western University, later in Europe. His prize-winning symphony, which will be performed this winter in Manhattan, he describes as "absolute, dissonant, and, I hope, pleasant."

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