Music: In Manhattan

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The twaddle and din of a radio station and the ancient ceremonial music heard in a Balinese temple prompted two new orchestral scores played last week.

Philip James, a pudgy New Jersey composer and radio conductor, led the New York Orchestra through his Station WGZBX, a satire more workmanlike than inspired which won him a $5,000 prize from National Broadcasting Co. (TIME, May 16, 1932). Horns and drums sputtered out static. Strings flurried hectically to suggest the buzz of talk. A subtitle ''Slumber Hour" was the excuse for a slow movement soggy with sentiment.

Bali, the sleepy Dutch East Indian island which has become a Utopia for jaded Occidentals, was one of the last ports of call for Composer Henry Eichheim, a great traveler since he stopped playing the violin in the Boston Symphony. Composer Eichheim was mightily impressed with the subtle variations the Balinese weave around their five-tone scale. His own Bali, a recording of these impressions, was played in Philadelphia by Leopold Stokowski to whom it was dedicated. A magnificent orchestration, replete with Balinese gongs and percussives, gave it true exotic coloring.