Review: Northern Sinfonia with Vivien Wood, The Sage Gateshead

Jun 29 2009 by David Whetstone, The Journal

A LOCAL girl came good on Saturday night, dancing what may not, in fact, turn out to be a swansong solo.

In 1971, when she was 11, Vivien Wood was helped by Gateshead Council to go to study at the Royal Ballet School in London.

It led to a highly successful career in dance – ballet and contemporary.

Now based back in the North East, Vivien was keen to give something back to her home town. Hence her moving dance interpretation of Bach’s Sonata no. 2 in A minor with the music courtesy of Northern Sinfonia’s effervescent lead violinist, Bradley Creswick.

Coming just before the interval, it was something extra special in a pretty special concert by the Sinfonia strings (plus harpsichord).

These few minutes of perfectly attuned music and movement were the distillation of some two years’ discussion and hard work.

As the Mayor of Gateshead, Coun John Eagle, said at a reception afterwards, it was "haunting". It is impossible to think we won’t see a repeat performance some time.

Under the directorship of Bradley, the rest of the programme scintillated too. A first half baroque feast – Vivaldi, Bach and Corelli – saw Jonathan Storer and Simon Browne making light work of Bach’s Concerto for Two Violins. After the interval, Bradley and colleagues delivered Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons at breakneck speed and in mesmerising fashion. Having whipped up a firestorm, Bradley stopped between movements to mop his brow and his violin, laughing as he did so.

There was an encore, of course. Sheer brilliance!