Víctor Braojos with an eclectic programme of music from his fellow countryman Enrique Granados
Romantic Scenes is an early work that owes much to Chopin or even in places early Fauré and was followed by two pieces from his masterpiece ‘Goyescas’ whose success in New York signalled the composers untimely death by a German torpedo in the English Channel.

The Escenas Romanticas is from Granados’s early period with the lilting melancholy of the Mazurka with its passionate central outburst before returning to the Mazurka again but with poignant insistence.There was the purity of the long solo recitativo and the the gentle strum of the guitar as an opening to the mellifluous radiance of the Berceuse. A passionate outpouring of sumptuous full sounds in the Lento con extasis and a folk melody of simple grace and beauty of the Allegretto.An Allegro Appassionato with a luminous outpouring of passionate romantic sounds and scintillating playing of great assurance.The Epilogo the best known of the set is a ravishing outpouring of Fauré type song of great beauty.

The Maiden and the Nightingale is one of the works by Granados most played and loved , and is a miniature tone poem of sumptuous subtle sounds. Victor played it with languid beauty allowing the sounds to envelope us with the Spanish warmth of nobility and strength.Even the nightingale was enchanted with Victor’s playing as it flew off into the distance on wings of song.

There was great drama from the opening notes of El amor y la muerte as Victor played with great authority and knowing intensity.A deep brooding and contemplation with a gentle final disintegration and a similar melodic outpouring as the Maiden but the nightingale this time was nowhere to be seen!

Very convincing performances of authority ,passion and simple beauty as one might expect from the artistry of a Spanish pianist whose progress at the Guildhall under Martin Roscoe I have followed and admired over last five years or so.From a very talented student Victor is now a distinguished artist ready to reveal many of the works from his native Spain that are still virtually unknown .

Goyescas, op 11, subtitled Los majosenamorados  (The Gallants in Love), is a piano suite written in 1911 and was inspired by the work of the Spanish artist Francisco Goya. The piano pieces have not been authoritatively associated with any particular paintings with two exceptions:

• El amor y la muerte (Love and death) shares its title with one of Goya’s prints from the series called Los caprichos
• El pelele (The straw man) is one of Goya’s paintings.
  This piano suite was written in two books. Work on Goyescas began in 1909, and by 31 August 1910, the composer was able to write that he had composed “great flights of imagination and difficulty.” Granados himself gave the première of Book I at the Palau de la Musica Catalana in Barcelona  on 11 March 1911. He completed Book II in December 1911 and gave its first performance at the Salle Pleyel  in Paris on 2 April 1914.
  
  Book I:
  Los requiebros (The Compliments)
  Coloquio en la reja (Conversation at the Window)
  El fandango de candil (Fandango by Candlelight)
  Quejas o La Maja y el Rui senior  (Complaint, or the Maiden and the Nightingale)
  
  Book II
  El Amor y la muerte (Balada) (Ballad of Love and Death)
  Epilogo: Serenata del espectro (Epilogue: Serenade of the Spectre)
  El Pelele: Escena Goyesca (The Puppet/Straw Dummy: Goya Scene)
  (El Pelele is technically not part of the suite, but very often played with it.)

Victor Braojos at St Mary’s The intelligence and aristocratic authority of a true musician

Víctor Braojos at St Mary’s authority and intelligence illuminates ‘Shreds of light’

Victor Braojos at Steinway Hall. New Artist’s Series for the Keyboard Trust

Victor Braojos at Wesley’s Chapel – Passion and Poetry united