Joaquín Rodrigo (1901–1999) composed his best-known work, Concierto de Aranjuez, a three-movement guitar concerto in Paris in 1939, during the tense months preceding the outbreak of World War Two. Rodrigo sought to evoke the atmosphere of the royal palace in Aranjuez by, as he put it, “capturing the fragrance of magnolias, the singing of birds, and the gushing of fountains”.

In 1991 Joaquín Rodrigo was raised to the Spanish nobility by King Juan Carlos I with the title of Marquis of the Gardens of Aranjuez. The concerto can pride itself in having a monument devoted to it in the city of Aranjuez, something that very few musical works can say for themselves. The second movement of the concerto was one of the best-known and most popular pieces of the twentieth century. In addition to various classical orchestral transcriptions, electronic, world-music and jazz versions exist, and it has also been used as a film soundtrack. World-famous jazz trumpeter Miles Davis said about the Aranjuez concerto, how the “melody was so strong that the softer you play it, the stronger it gets and the stronger you play it, the weaker it gets”.