François-Clément-Théodore Dubois (1837-1924) began his studies at the Paris Conservatory in 1854. He attended the composition class of Ambroise Thomas, whom he succeeded as director of the institute in 1896. Throughout his life, Dubois was notable for his rich field of activity. As organist, he worked at Les Invalides (1855-1858) then at Sainte Clotilde, where he was a colleague of César Franck, the then director of music at Sainte Clotilde. In 1861, Dubois was awarded the Prix de Rome. In Italy he became acquainted with Franz Liszt, who gave him further encouragement. At the end of 1863, Dubois returned to Paris, where he succeeded Franck as director of music at Sainte Clotilde. In 1869 he was appointed choirmaster at Sainte Madeleine. There, in 1877, he took over the position of organist, previously held by Saint-Saëns.

Along with Camille Saint-Saëns, Dubois was one of the most important active members of the Société nationale, which was founded on 25 February 1871. Saint-Saëns reported that ‘the Committee united reactionary Classicists and progressive Wagnerians alike, yet they got on together most agreeably. It was an artistic circle, if you will, but no sworn community.’ This society wanted to support young French composers and to get their works performed. By no means did Dubois seek relentless confrontation with the popular ‘classical’ music of the time that attracted large audiences in the Concerts populaires de musique classique that had been founded in 1861 by Jules-Etienne Pasdeloup (1819-1887). Dubois demanded tolerance on both sides - from the musicien avancé as well as the musicien rétrogardé. At the same time he wished for an independent French music marked by ‘clarity, form and charm’ (‘la clarté, la forme et le charme’).

Concerts with big orchestral works, as were popular with the young French, were expensive: ‘The National Society has one great shortcoming; it is not rich and its meagre income does not allow it to organize sensational and costly performances’ (Saint-Saëns). Saint-Saëns refers to the significance of the firms Pleyel and Erard who first made costly perfomances possible: ‘Of the three concerts with orchestras which the society organizes every year, two take place thanks to the firms Pleyel and Erard.’ It is possible that these sponsors, both piano-makers, also prompted new compositions for pedal piano and orchestra.

In 1880, Dubois travelled to Munich with Gabriel Fauré in order to see performances of Richard Wagner’s works in his native Germany. Wagner’s musical language filled Dubois with enthusiasm. He thought especially highly of Die Meistersinger. In his own work however, he maintained an elegant style, influenced by Classical examples.

Dubois’ Fantaisie triomphale shows a Wagnerian pathos that does credit to the work’s name. It was composed in September 1889 in Rosnay (France). The fantasy was premièred at the opening of the Chicago Auditorium on 9 December 1889. The organ part was played by Clerence Eddy, the work’s dedicatee. The work juxtaposes and combines opposing themes in a form that is clearly classical in its structures. Particularly noteworthy are its modal echoes, its middle section pulsating with polonaise rhythms, and the use of bells to make the close particularly effective.

After Gounod’s death, Théodore Dubois was elected to the Institut de France. On 29 November 1894 he read his recently-published notes on Gounod at the Paris Institute (Notice sur Charles Gounod). Dubois was not merely Gounod’s official successor, for his compositions also show a spiritual affinity with those of Gounod.

Charles Gounod (1818-1893) was one of the most important composers of the Romantic period in France. He became known especially for his operas Faust (1859) and Roméo et Juliette (1867). In the church music repertoire, he is represented by varied arrangements of his Ave Maria, mélodie religieuse adaptée au Ier prélude de J.S. Bach (1859). Although his instrumental works are less known, they are unjustly forgotten. Claude Debussy described Gounod as a composer who somehow managed to elude the Wagnerianism that had such a lasting impact on the Romantic period in France. His compositions are distinguished rather by their French gentility: ‘Gounod a su échapper au genre impérieux de Wagner et représente un moment de la sensibilité française’. (Claude Debussy: M. Croche antidilettant). Gounod worked as an organist at the Mission Etrangère in Paris from 1843 onwards, and between 1877 and 1892 in St Cloud, a western suburb of Paris.

In the 1880s, Gounod met the young Lucie Palicot, whose virtuoso performance on the pedal grand piano kindled the enthusiasm of the nearly seventy-year-old master. A small measure of fondness was perhaps also in play – how else can one explain the fact that Gounod wanted to entrust the composition of an official hymn for the Paris World Exhibition in 1889 to Lucie’s husband, who was a little-known composer? This idea was thwarted by the outraged reaction of the Parisian music world.

There is proof that pedal clavichords and pedal cembali had existed since the 15th century, and were used by organists as domestic practice instruments. Even though the use of plucked keyboard instruments decreased by the end of the 18th century, this tradition was further developed in pedal grand pianos. A good example of this is a pedal grand piano built in 1815 by Joseph Brodenmann, which today stands in the instrument collection of the Viennese Musuem for the History of Art.

The period of Historicism in the second half of the 19^th century brought new, but short-lived popularity for the pedal grand piano. Around 1850, the French piano factory Erard delivered a grand piano with 32 pedals to the eccentric piano virtuoso Charles-Valentin Alkan (1813-1888). Some of Alkan’s later works were composed not solely for the organ, but also – as an alternative – for this special instrument. Such pieces include the Treize priéres op. 64 (ca 1870), Douze études (ca 1871), Douze fugues (undated), Onze grands préludes and an arrangement of Handel’s Messiah op. 66 (ca 1870) and the Impromptus on Luther’s Chorale op. 69 (ca 1871). In 1845, Robert Schumann composed his Studies op. 56 and his Sketches op. 58 for pedal piano. With his Six Fugues on the name BACH op. 60, Schumann showed that pedal grand pianos and organs are closely related instruments as far as their construction and their musical possibilities are concerned. The original title specifically states ‘for organ or pedal piano’.

Though Franz Liszt left no compositions for the pedal piano, it was an instrument that he much appreciated. He published his great organ works in versions for piano, and made piano transcriptions of many of Bach’s organ works. Although the Grand orgue assumes the part of the Piano pédalier in the present recording, this is legitimized by the performance practice of the 19th century and by the organ-like structure of the works performed.

Gounod’s Fantaisie sur l’Hymne Nationale Russe was composed around 1885 and published in 1886. It is based on the Russian national anthem, composed by Alexei Fedorovitch Lvov (1799-1870), that was in use until 1917. A short wind fanfare precedes the theme, which is then played antiphonally by the organ and the orchestra. In the course of the piece, Gounod places variations that are more or less complete alongside recitative-like passages and lyrical melodies. At the triumphal close, the hymn is played by the full orchestra over arpeggios in the organ, with a bass line conceived after the manner of pealing bells.

The influence of Bach on Gounod is reflected in this work. The virtuosic pedal part and the figurations in both hands allude to the Baroque style, but dress it up in Romantic harmonies. Gounod had already come into contact with the compositions of Johann Sebastian Bach in the winter of 1840/41, thanks to Fanny Hensel. In 1843, Felix Mendelssohn-Barholdy, who incidentally also owned a pedal grand piano, played him some of his own organ works as well as some of Bach’s in St Thomas’s church in Leipzig.

Around 1885, Gounod composed the large-scale Suite concertante, which was first performed in 1885 in the Salle Erard by Lucie Palicot, with the composer on the second piano. In 1888, Camille Saint-Saëns published an arrangement of the piece for piano duet. It is not certain when the version for pedal piano and orchestra was played for the first time, but we know that the work was performed in 1887 in London at a concert of the Philharmonic Society. Several perfomances of the Suite are documented. On the occasion of a Gounod Festival in Angers at which the composer himself was present, the work was conducted by Édouard Colonne in a concert that took place on 6 February 1888. The piano part was, of course, played by Lucie Palicot. Paul Landormy (in Charles Gounod, Paris 1942) described his impressions as follows: ‘I was there, I was at Colonne’s concert, and I recall the strange impression made by this quite gracious, delicate person perched upon an immense box containing the low strings of the pedals, underneath a grand piano that itself was resting on the box; and above all, that which surprised us, though quite agreeably, was the sight of Madame Palicot dressed in a short skirt that reached only to her knees – necessarily, of course, but astonishing at that time – and wearing out her pretty legs as they adroitly played the different piano pedals that lay beneath her legs; the whole resembled the pedal box of an organ’. On 4 April 1890, when Charles Gounod conducted his last official concert in the Théâtre du Châtelet, the programme again included the Piano Concerto with Madame Palicot as soloist.

The composition is merry in nature. The opening movement alternates between fanfares and broad melodic lines. It is followed by an effective Allegro con fuoco ‘La chasse’ in the manner of hunting music, that is interrupted by a cantabile middle section, repeated at the end. Saint-Saëns’ famous Danse macabre, composed in 1874, may have been the stimulus for this piece. In the wonderfully flowing arioso Andante, Gounod shows himself a master of the lyrical style and of unusual orchestration. The finale, set in a dance-like tarantella rhythm, forms an effective conclusion to the work.

Alexandre Guilmant, a pupil of Lemmens, is probably the most eminent Classicist in the field of French organ music. Guilmant was, like many of his contemporaries, a versatile musician who kept close contact with other composers of his generation. In 1871, Guilmant became organist at St Trinité in Paris. In 1894, he and Vincent d’Indy founded the Schola Cantorum. Joseph Bonnet and Marcel Dupré were among his pupils. Guilmant published various writings on interpretation and improvisation. In the ten-volume Archive des Maîtres de l’Orgue, he published the complete works of Titelouze and Clérambault. He was also the first French organist to tour America, Russia, Spain, Italy and England.

Guilmant’s oeuvre consists mainly of vocal works and of music for organ. He often utilized Gregorian melodies and chorale-like motives in his thematic material – something that many of his successors adopted. Today, Guilmant is principally known for his eight organ symphonies (which he called ‘Sonatas’). Beside those of Charles-Marie Widor (1844-1937) and Louis Vierne (1870-1937), his count among the most excellent examples of this new genre.

The aesthetic and tonal proximity of the organ to the orchestra inevitably led Guilmant to combine both together – something that Hector Berlioz had refused to contemplate in his manual of orchestration. Guilmant did not conceive the organ as a substitute for the symphony orchestra, but as an instrument with independent tonal qualities. Though Guilmant’s works for organ and orchestra are arrangements of his own compositions for organ solo, these arrangements themselves show Guilmant’s mastery. Because of the greater effectiveness of the orchestral versions, it is not surprising that these are frequently (falsely) described in the literature as being the originals.