Like the more famous Doce danzas españolas, Valses Poéticos features a fluency of melodic invention and a modest, grounded diatonicism that makes its musical discourse conspicuously unforced, lucid aristocratic and elegant at the core. In it, the waltz is explored with great inventiveness; the opening one sounds like a picture of equilibrium, there are invocations of Strauss in no.4, the Parisian cafe in no.5, a lyrical, reflective melancholy in no.6 and true exuberance in no.8.