These are as persuasive performances of Granados's Spanish Dances as I have ever heard from a non-Spanish pianist. Angela Hewitt's playing is distinguished by an exceptional sensitivity to tone-colour and to contrasts of dynamics (note the fine grading of the ''Asturiana'' from its quiet opening to grandiose climaxes); her rhythm is full of vitality—deliciously springy in ''Valenciana'' and with an engaging kick in the vigorous ''Fandango''; and with very few exceptions she judges the degree of flexibility to a nicety. (I would myself have preferred a little less rubato in the middle sections of ''Villanesca'' and ''Jota'', but these are subjective reactions.) And she has a real feeling for atmosphere, catching the mysterious melancholy of ''Oriental'' and the flamboyance of the fiery initial declamation of ''Galante'', and in ''Romantica'': she misses the mark only in the ''Melancolica'' which, as with so many pianists, sounds altogether too cheerful for what is labelled a danza triste.
In the Goyescas she has an opportunity to display her virtuosity, crispness of attack and clean finger-work in the ''Straw dummy''; but the famous ''Maiden and the nightingale'', played with the greatest intensity, is treated so freely that it is saved only by the finesse of Hewitt's timbres and tonal control.'