St. Vincent de Paul Parish

Chicago, IL

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The Lyon & Healy Pipe Organ, Opus 90

The Lyon & Healy Company of Chicago built and installed the organ in November 1901. It is one of the first electro-pneumatic instruments of its kind and was the third largest instrument built by the firm. The organ sounds much as it did at the turn of the previous century and remains a classic example of a Romantic-American organ.

The organ has 50 ranks, numbering just under 3,000 pipes, that are distributed over swell, great, and choir divisions. Many unique orchestral stops such as the bell clarinet and nine ranks of strings contribute to the grand symphonic tonality of the instrument.
Since taking its first breath in November of 1901, the most prominent voice in liturgy at Saint Vincent has been the magnificent Lyon & Healy pipe organ. With 50 individual sets of pipes (ranks) played over three manuals (keyboards), the organ has over 3,000 individual pipes. The mechanics of the instrument have been updated, but the original pipework of this historic instrument has been restored to its original glory of over a century ago.

In keeping with the style of American organs at the end of the Nineteenth Century, our organ was built in a romantic, symphonic style with a full range of sounds capable of imitating the sound of an entire orchestra. Although few organs of Lyon & Healy remain today, this is the second largest still in existence and its voice can be heard praising God virtually every Sunday just as it did over a century ago.