CLASSICAL music lovers are not known for keeping up with the latest developments in drum and bass or house music.

But they became more familiar with cutting-edge sounds than they bargained for at a concert at the University of York.

Aficionados at the Central Hall for Northern Sinfonia's rendition of Mozart and Britten were less than amused when music from nearby Vanburgh College began filtering into the second half of their concert.

In Vanburgh, students were dancing the night away to a live funk band, drum and bass, and DJs playing house music.

Now, in a bid to minimise disruptions to both parties, the university's music department is considering restricting the classical concerts to week nights.

University spokeswoman Hilary Layton said: "It's a busy campus and on some occasions our noise can be heard in other parts of the city.

"Students are entitled to organise their own events whenever they like, and student events are likely to be on a weekend.

"We are considering holding all concerts mid-week to address the problem."

She said acoustics and bad weather could affect how noise travelled.

But Evening Press music reviewer Martin Dreyer, who attended Saturday's concert, said shifting all concerts to week nights was "silly".

He said: "The weekend is when people have leisure time and are free to go to concerts, more so than during the week.

"All it would take is for a message to be sent to all the neighbouring colleges to let them know there's a concert on and asking for discos to start at 10pm.

"People are reasonable. They wouldn't start a disco earlier if they knew it was going to cause problems."

Students' union services officer Chris Osborne said it was unfortunate the two events had clashed.

He said: "It can't be nice to have drum and bass pumping in your ear if you're trying to listen to classical music, but that's the consequence of the limited space we've got on campus.

"Students tend to want their nights out to be on a weekend too, and quite often it will clash with other events. It's a small campus but the space is efficiently used.

"We try to put on entertainment for 1,000 students on Friday and Saturday nights during term time, and last Saturday's event was sold out within 20 minutes, so they're popular enough to warrant what we're doing."

Updated: 10:57 Thursday, February 12, 2004