Though these two works were written fairly close in time to each other, and there is a slight resemblance between their openings, they are remarkably different in style. As Stephen Dodgson's excellent note points out, the impressionist Nights in the gardens of Spain owes so much to Debussy—its original title of Nocturnes, its structure, harmony and orchestration—that ''paradoxically, Falla was never more French than in the very work which confirmed his profound Spanishness'', while The three-cornered hat combines incisiveness, folk rhythms and harmonies and more than a touch of neo-classicism. The present performances are captivating. The proper proportions of piano and orchestra in Nights are exceptionally well realized—too often we hear the work dominated by the piano when it should be merely 'first among equals'. In the first movement Tzimon Barto's lucid and delicate passagework aptly suggests the cool plashing of the fountains in the Generalife, and later his reiterated notes, not hammered out as they sometimes are, do evoke the thrumming of a guitar: the reminiscences of the flamenco melismata in the last movement are truly poetic. Marriner exactly matches (as few do) the sordamente atmosphere of the ''Dance in the distance'' and is suitably boisterous in the finale, but what lingers in my mind are his beautifully eloquent last pages. Is the very start of the work a shade fast to convey the desired tranquillity, and the Poco piu animato also on the fast side? And should the stringendo in the second movement start quite so early? Never mind: this is a performance to cherish, and admirably recorded (with a gorgeous ff splash at the climax of the first movement).
I was startled by the introduction to the ballet (with its rowdy timpani, fanfare and cries of ''Ole!'') being taken faster than I have ever heard; and Ann Murray is unfortunately both over-vibrant and too distantly placed (even for an offstage effect), with a resulting complete loss of the words; but once the ballet proper gets under way there is nothing but enjoyment ahead. The score's colours glow in southern sunshine, the rhythmic sections are crisply pungent, the seductive playfulness in the music for the miller's wife is well brought out, and there is prissiness in the old-fashioned minuet for the Corregidor: the innumerable allusions (a closed book to nearly all but native Spaniards) are pointed, but overall it is Marriner's dramatic sense and feeling for continuity, plus first-class orchestral playing, that makes this disc so persuasive.'