Debussy - Arabesque No. 1

The Two Arabesques (Deux arabesques), L. 66, is a pair of arabesques composed for piano by Claude Debussy. They are two of Debussy's earliest works, composed between the years 1888 and 1891, when he was still in his twenties.
Although quite an early work, the arabesques contain hints of Debussy's developing musical style. The suite is one of the very early impressionistic pieces of music, following the French visual art form. Debussy seems to wander through modes and keys, and achieves evocative scenes through music.

This arabesque is in the key of E major. This piece begins with parallelism of triads in first inversion, a composition technique very much used by Debussy and the impressionist movement. It leads into a larger section beginning with a left hand arpeggio in E major and a descending right hand E major pentatonic progression.
The second quieter B section is in A major, which starts with a gesture (E-D-E-C♯), briefly passes through E major, returns to A major and ends with a bold pronouncement of the E-D-E-C♯ gesture, but transposed to the key of C major, played forte.
In the middle of the recapitulation of the A section, the music moves to a higher register and descends, followed by a large pentatonic scale ascending and descending, and resolving back to E major.