Decades of gestation and seasoning inform Peter Donohoe’s excellently engineered readings of Albéniz’s Iberia Books 1 and 2 and the first part of Granados’s Goyescas.

In Iberia’s opening salvo. ‘Evocación’, the pianist favours textural delicacy and subtle demarcation of subito dynamics over the more impulsive unfolding of phrases and personalised rubato characterising other readings. While little heel-clicking transpires in the syncopations and stinging accents of ‘El puerto’, Donohoe’s shaping of the long broken-chord sequences of ‘El Corpus en Sevilla’ minimises their potential for clatter and shrillness.

The pianist begins ‘Rondeña’ deliberately, yet gains noticeable momentum as the music progresses; notice how clearly he distinguishes the composer’s alternating slurs and staccatos in the right-hand thirds. If Donohoe’s ‘Triana’ sounds less crisp and incisive on the surface than Alicia de Larrocha (Decca) in the opening pages, it may have to do with his taking Albéniz’s pedal markings on faith. Although Donohoe doesn’t match Nelson Goerner’s untrammelled abandon in the central climax of ‘Almería’ (Alpha, 7/22), I’m moved by the heartfelt lyricism and easy lilt that he brings to the main theme.

At first hearing, Goyescas’s opening ‘Los requiebros’ sounds less fiery and more dynamically contained next to José Menor’s impassioned force (IBS, 12/17), yet Donohoe’s savvy textural organisation and unearthed left-hand inner voices begin to reveal themselves. He may not evoke the street band of ‘El fandango de candil’ to Jean-Philippe Collard’s swaggering effect (La Dolce Volta, 4/20), yet no left-hand countermelody goes unnoticed. Donohoe plays ‘Quejas, o La maja y el ruiseñor’ by the book, with no sense of surprise in the over-loud coda. However, the pianist’s concentration and sustained introspection in ‘Coloquio en la reja’ held my rapt attention. The latter augurs well for the cycle’s emotional centrepiece ‘El amor y la muerte’ in Donohoe’s hands, but that will have to wait until he records Goyescas’s second part and Iberia’s remaining books. As the cliché goes … to be continued!