“The young Spanish pianist Elena Font here presents an interesting debut album that occasionally confounds expectations of the music it contains. It’s a well-conceived programme of music from roughly the fin de siècle era, when there was considerable Spanish influence on French composers: both sets of Debussy’s Images, Ravel’s Le tombeau de Couperin and, in between, a suite from Manuel de Falla’s El amor brujo.

Font’s career is on the up, with a number of international debuts, a duo with Pascal Rogé and praise for her affinity with French music. In this recital she quickly establishes a personal presence, offering a strong, forthright sound, considerable warmth and some fieriness, qualities heard to best advantage in the de Falla. Nevertheless, that affinity for French music seems in surprisingly short supply. If you like your Debussy subtle, opaline and smooth-surfaced, you might not get along with this performance of Images, which veers towards the over-literal. Too often challenging moments, like the different layers of melody and figuration in ‘Poissons d’or’, seem to involve taking excess time; some background textures could use more lightness of touch, while many opportunities for nuance, or a change of light, shade or angle, pass.