Claude Debussy composed Images, a three-piece cycle for piano, in 1894. The cycle was only eventually published in its entirety in 1977, entitled Image (oubliées). The reason for adding the words “forgotten” was to prevent it from being confused with his other two popular Images cycles, published in 1905 and 1907 respectively. Maurice Ravel orchestrated the Sarabande in 1923, and Zoltán Kocsis created an orchestral transcription of the other two pieces. The first, “melancholic and sweet” first piece is followed by the Sarabande, which Debussy instructed to be performed “[…] with dignified and slow elegance, not unlike an old portrait, a memory from the Louvre, etc. […]” The vigorous and humorous third piece is based on the first line of the French nursery song “Nous n’irons plus au bois”.

Images (oubliées)

No. I. Lent (Mélancolique et doux)

No. II. Sarabande (Ravel’s orchestration)

No. III. Quelques aspects