Scandinavian

Some conservative music circles would have you believe credible concert programs can't be built around Scandinavian or English music. Not true, but even if it were, Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia's Scandinavian Perspectives program represented chances worth taking. Certainly, the precise, forceful guest conductor Dirk Bross? took no easy ways out Monday at the Kimmel Center, with seldom-heard works by well-known composers Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius and familiar ones by obscure ones (Dag Wir?n)

Greg Norman shot a 65 yesterday to take a 1-stroke lead over Scott Hoch after the second round of the Buick Open. Norman's 7-under round left him at 132. Hoch, the first-round leader, followed his tournament record-tying 63 with a 70 at Warwick Hills Golf and Country Club. Payne Stewart, the U.S. Open champion, shot 74-79 and missed the cut, which was 141, 3 under par. Other notables missing the cut included Davis Love 3d, Wayne Levi, Mark Calcavecchia, Tom Kite and Raymond Floyd.

A British Airways jumbo jet and a Scandinavian Airlines System jet nearly collided over this Atlantic island, and an Icelandic air-control official said yesterday that human error was at fault. Peter Einarsson, head of Icelandic Air Control, said that "a series of human mistakes" led to the planes' passing within about 200 feet of each other Monday. Almost 600 people were aboard the two planes. SAS spokeswoman Monika Backlund said in Stockholm that the British Airways Boeing 747 and the Scandinavian DC-8 were flying in the same air corridor at the same altitude - 33,000 feet - over southwestern Iceland.

At noon Saturday, Woodbury christened the Christmas season with a parade that wound down Broad Street from the police station to Dunkin Donuts and back again, to Santa's headquarters at Scandinavian Design. The chief attraction was Santa Claus, who greeted children from atop an aerial platform truck provided by the Woodbury Fire Company. Another feature of the parade, sponsored each year by the Woodbury Merchant's Guild, was the Woodbury High School homecoming float. It had a sleigh pulled by a cow - the Heritage cow, the mascot of Heritage Dairy Stores.

At the corner of Seventh and Market Streets in Perkasie sits a modest two- story brick building with American and Swedish flags flapping in the autumn breeze. The exterior is peaceful, but inside, the corporate headquarters for Scandinavian Naturals sings with the rhythm of rapid typing, ringing telephones, beeping faxes and the furor of a relentless printer - all creating the tune of a multimillion-dollar natural medicines and cosmetics business. The frenzied pace signifies good business, but CEO and owner Hokan Cederberg prefers the slightly more calming atmosphere on the second floor.

Aging waterfront factories and small industrial towns now rise from the land that Swedish and Finnish pioneers first carved from wilderness 350 years ago in what is now Salem County. Like the early settlements, however, the presence of those pilgrims in the Delaware River Valley has been obscured by the layers of humanity that followed. "There's a very large population in South Jersey that has some Swedish blood, but very little attention has been paid to the 17th century origin of the area," said Daniel Erickson 3d, who was originally from South Jersey and now lives in Burke, Va. He recently traced his bloodline to the early Swedish settlers.

Add the Icelandic sextet Of Monsters and Men to that list of rock acts with a "Philadelphia story. " Joined by seventh musician Ragnhildur Gunnarsdóttir on trumpet, accordion, and keyboards, the cheerful Icelanders delivered an exultant 90-minute set at the Theatre of Living Arts on Tuesday. It was the first of two sold-out nights and their purposefully chosen live Philadelphia debut, coming on the release date of their keenly anticipated debut album, My Head Is an Animal. The Philly honor roll that Of Monsters and Men has now joined includes old regional faves such as Yes and Peter Frampton (both playing before 130,000 at a gate-crashed JFK Stadium gig in June '76)

Kenny Knox, playing with no back pain for the first time in two months, shot a 6-under-par 64 yesterday to tie Ed Humenik for the lead in the first round of the Greater Hartford Open. Ted Schulz and Sonny Skinner were 1 stroke back, just ahead of a pack of eight golfers at 4 under. Knox's main concern entering the tournament was his health. He had missed two tournaments with a bulging disk that made walking up stairs difficult. But the swing Knox had been seeking to recapture since 1986 - his best year on the PGA tour - suddenly came back yesterday.

The tree-lined uphill drive leads to 500 acres where children once played and campfires once flickered. Most of the old cabins are gone now, and the swimming pool has been filled in, but the YMCA residence camp off Route 322 just south of Downingtown remains in the minds of many Downingtown residents. The campground, sold six years ago, is now being developed. "I spent a lot of happy days up there as a kid," said Donald Greenleaf, Downingtown's borough manager, who remembers trekking up the big hill to summer camp.

THERE IS pointed irony, no doubt, in the Super Bowl week DVD release of "The Tillman Story. " This is a first-rate documentary about Pat Tillman, the Arizona Cardinal safety who quit pro ball to enlist in the Army Rangers after 9/11, and was killed in a friendly-fire incident in Afghanistan. The movie builds a circumstantial case for a conspiracy (ultimately futile) to cover up the events surrounding Tillman's death, a conspiracy that reaches high into the Bush administration. But the movie is more interesting for its unforgettable portrait of the freethinking, unclassifiable Tillman, described by a comrade as a "true American original," certainly a dwindling national resource.