The third and fourth of Spanish violinist-composer Pablo de Sarasate's eight Spanish Dances for violin and piano—a group of pieces commissioned by the publishing firm of N. Simrock for inclusion in the ethnic dance series launched by Brahms' Hungarian Dances and continued with Dvorák's Slavonic Dances—are entitled Romanza andaluza and Jota navarra, and were published together as Op. 22 in 1879; Sarasate dedicated them to the famous Bohemian violinist Wilma Neruda, who, after marrying the Swedish composer Frederick Norman, took the stage name Norman-Neruda. The two dances are true complements to one another. The Romanza andaluza is a generally relaxed, warm-souled rhapsody in several sections and with many stylishly folk-like (but not in fact Andalusian) melodies and a few brief outbursts of virtuoso display, while the Jota navarra is a fleet-footed, Navarrese take on the energetic jota dance originally native to Aragón.

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Sarasate's Andalusian Romance, the first of two Spanish dances published as Op. 22, takes its title but not its themes from southern Spain. The melodies certainly sound folk-like, beginning with the warm, lyrical initial theme, accompanied by a rocking rhythmic piano accompaniment. The music soon begins ascending into higher registers, dropping lower, and shooting up again, while somehow maintaining a relaxed stance. Sarasate offers a second, somewhat simpler theme, which he immediately begins complicating with rich ornamentation (a practice he had established in the first thematic section). The easy tempo and frankly unimaginative accompaniment continue through most of the remainder of the piece, whose technical challenges do not become evident to the listener until about two-thirds of the way through, beginning with persistent double-stop material and ending with airy trills and a high whistle.

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Sarasate's Andalusian Romance, the first of two Spanish dances published as Op. 22, takes its title but not its themes from southern Spain. The melodies certainly sound folk-like, beginning with the warm, lyrical initial theme, accompanied by a rocking rhythmic piano accompaniment. The music soon begins ascending into higher registers, dropping lower, and shooting up again, while somehow maintaining a relaxed stance. Sarasate offers a second, somewhat simpler theme, which he immediately begins complicating with rich ornamentation (a practice he had established in the first thematic section). The easy tempo and frankly unimaginative accompaniment continue through most of the remainder of the piece, whose technical challenges do not become evident to the listener until about two-thirds of the way through, beginning with persistent double-stop material and ending with airy trills and a high whistle.

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