Cathedral of the Holy Cross
Gothic Revival cathedral housing a five-thousand-pipe organ once silenced by decades of decay.
Location
About this audio guide
Cathedral of the Holy Cross's guide follows its enormous 1875 pipe organ, once the largest built in America, through the decades it fell silent after decay stripped it of its original console. It centers on organist Leo Abbott, who arrived in 1986 to find the instrument in disrepair and staged an annual benefit recital to fund its rebuilding, one show a year for over two decades running. Stand beneath the loft to take in the scale of what he was trying to save.
This audio guide was created using AI.
Similar places
Old South Church in Boston
Venetian Gothic sanctuary whose chancel hides a rescued nineteen-twenties municipal concert organ.
Trinity Church
Romanesque stone church resting on thousands of wooden pilings sunk into filled tidal marshland.
Museum of African American History
Oldest surviving Black church building in the country, restored using clues dug from its own backyard.
Symphony Hall
Shoebox concert hall funded by stock shares, engineered by the first scientific acoustics in the world.
The First Church of Christ, Scientist
Domed sanctuary where a Bible and a founding text, never a preacher, are read aloud as pastor.
King's Chapel
Colonial granite church raised from boulders gathered off nearby farm fields and cracked open by fire.