early 1850s he had started giving public concerts in Paris, featuring Bach's organ music and using the brilliant foot technique he had learnt in Germany. At the same time Lemmens had published 18 installments of an organ manual for the use of "organistes du culte catholique", giving a complete introduction to the Bach tradition of organ playing, henceforth adopted in France. In 1855, the piano firm Érard introduced a new instrument, the pedal piano (), a grand piano fitted with a full German-style pedalboard. The French composer, organist and virtuoso pianist Charles Valentin Alkan and Lemmens gave concerts on it, including performances of Bach's toccatas, fugues and chorale preludes for organ. In 1858, Franck, a friend of Alkan, acquired a pédalier for his private use. Alkan, a devotee of Bach and one of the first subscribers to the Bach Gesellschaft, composed extensively for the pédalier, including in 1866 a set of twelve studies for pedalboard alone. In the 1870s, Alkan, by that time a recluse, returned to give a series of public Petits Concerts each year in the Salle Érard using their pédalier: Alkan's repertoire included the St Anne prelude as well as several chorale preludes. There were further indications of changes in taste in France: Saint-Saëns, organist at the Madeleine from 1857 to 1877, refused to perform operatic arias as part of the liturgy, on one occasion replying to such a request, "Monsieur l'Abbé, when I hear from the pulpit the language of the Opéra Comique, I will play light music. Not before!" Saint-Saëns was nevertheless reluctant to use Bach's music in services. He regarded the preludes, fugues, toccatas and variations as virtuosic pieces for concert performance; and the chorale preludes as too Protestant in spirit for inclusion in a Catholic mass. The St Anne prelude and fugue was often used by Saint-Saëns for inaugurating Cavaillé-Coll organs; in Paris; he played for the inaugurations at St Sulpice (1862), Notre Dame (1868), Trinité (1869), the chapel in Versailles (1873) and the Trocadéro (1878). The last two decades of the 19th century saw a revival of interest in Bach's organ music in France. There were public concerts on the new Cavaillé-Colle organ in the concert hall or Salle des Fêtes of the old Palais du Trocadéro, built for the third Paris exhibition in 1878. Organized by the organist Alexandre Guilmant, a pupil of Lemmens, in conjunction with Eugène Gigout, these started