Orthodox musicians considered...[Saint-Saens]...eccentric ; more modern thinkers admired his mixture of Teutonic severity with the ultra-saccharine melodiousness of Gounod. Both parties agreed to recognize in the then organist of the Paris Madeleine (a post held by Saint-Saens from 1858 until 1877) a musician of prodigious talent, endowed with a versatility that enabled him to shine in every branch of his art, and possessed of a mastery of technique that could adapt itself to whatsoever style he might for the moment choose to exploit. He was as brilliant a pianist as he was an organist, his habit of playing the one instrument never spoiled his exquisite touch for the other, and his gift of improvisation was marvelous. Saint-Saens made his debut in London, in 1871, at the Musical Union; but I did not hear him until 1879, when he played his own pianoforte concerto in G minor at the Philharmonic.