Enrique Granados performed extensively in Spain, France and the United States, collaborating with many of the leading artists of his day. His first masterpiece was the collection of 12 Danzas españolas, refined and expressive evocations of the richness of Spain’s regions and dances, which gained high praise by composers as diverse as Massenet, Saint-Saëns, Grieg and Cui. By turns vivacious, melancholy and hypnotic, they are as fresh as his poetic Improvisation on the Valencian Jota, heard here in a transcription from a piano roll recording made by Granados himself.
