You don't see banjo players on the orchestral platform all that often; musicians who trigger samples of cow noises are even rarer. John Adams's concerto, Gnarly Buttons, calls for both. This folksy hoedown with Dixieland diversions also provides an impressive showcase for the Northern Sinfonia's principal clarinettist Dov Goldberg, who is only the second UK soloist to have attempted the fiendish but fun work.

Nostalgic, deceptively simple refrains waft throughout the texture, forming Adams's homage to his father's collection of Benny Goodman records. These are interspersed by raucous outbursts of pure hillbilly expressionism, perfidious passages in which it is impossible to be sure whether the cracks and squeals are intentional or not. The banjo player should at least have gained a programme credit, while the lady with the sampler lowed magnificently.

The piece was prefaced with a vintage piece of signature Adams: his enigmatic New England memoir, Shaker Loops. This hermetic example of tail-chasing minimalism is more an example of multi-pitched oscillation than an actual piece of music, but if you listen carefully there are nuances of ecstatic religious trances, creaking rocking chairs and badly oiled wicket gates. In charge was the Northern Sinfonia's young conductor in association, the 25-year-old Russian Andrei Danilov. Directing Adams's complex numeric formations can sound closer to accountancy than conducting; this programme gave little hint of Danilov's dynamic range, but at least we are assured that he can count.

You sometimes wonder why the Northern Sinfonia bothers with conductors at all. The second half was given over to the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, with the leader of the orchestra, Bradley Creswick, on duty as both soloist and director. The boundlessly enthusiastic Creswick yomped through the work's Romantic peaks and troughs with his band on a short rope not far behind.

This wasn't the subtlest of Tchaikovsky interpretations, but it was charged with the visceral thrill of a chamber band playing through a collective will, not subjected to an individual ego. Creswick's negotiation of the treacherous cadenza was masterful, accompanied only by the growling ostinato of the buses outside. Northern Sinfonia's relocation to the new Music Centre on the bank of the Tyne cannot come soon enough.