Author of the immensely popular Recuerdos de la Alhambra, Francisco Tárrega (1852-1909) is one of Spain's greatest composers for the guitar. His music, exemplified by the enchantingly soulful Recuerdos de la Alhambra, reflects the composer's poetic imagination as well his extraordinary mastery of the instrument. A remarkable tremolo study, this work evokes the atmosphere of an imaginary, idealized Spanish-Moorish landscape redolent of magical gardens and palaces of love and Romantic dreams. Scholars have questioned the popular story, which claims that this work was inspired by the Moorish Palace in Alhambra, explaining that the true source of the composer's inspiration was his lover Doña Concepcion de Jacoby.

Known as the "Sarasate of the guitar," Tárrega was anything but a brilliant virtuoso who also composed. His repertoire included transcriptions for guitar of piano music by Mendelssohn, Thalberg, Gottschalk, Beethoven, and Chopin, and these transcriptions enabled him to develop a rich compositional idiom that was both imaginative and technically demanding.

Like his friend Isaac Albéniz, Tárrega was a leading force of Alhambrismo, the movement that sought to forge a unique form of Romanticism blending Europe's musical legacy with the rich folk traditions of Spain, including the Moorish influences. Another example of stylized Spanish-Moorish music is Tárrega's Capricho árabe, dedicated to another eminent Alhambrist, Tomás Bretón. Author of more than 70 original compositions and 120 transcriptions for guitar, Tárrega played a crucial role in the rebirth of the guitar as a solo instrument in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In the mid-nineteenth century, the guitar was, even in Spain, totally eclipsed by the piano, the Romantic instrument par excellence. By the late 1870s, however, Tárrega was working as a successful concert guitarist, starting a career that would culminate in international acclaim. His legacy was continued in the twentieth century by his students, who included Emilio Pujol.

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