Францисканска църква, Виена

The Franziskanerkirche in central Vienna is a Franciscan monastery church combining daily religious services with concerts and other cultural events. Its former friars’ prayer choir houses the Wöckherl organ of 1642, the oldest organ in Vienna. More than ninety per cent of the instrument’s original pipe material survives. Public presentations allow visitors to hear the organ in a space that is normally closed to general access. Restoration work also revealed historic grisaille paintings in the prayer choir. The church’s musical heritage is thus preserved both through a substantial early-Baroque instrument and through the decorated room in which it stands. Vienna's only church front in Renaissance dress rises on the small square east of the Stephansdom that carries the Franciscans' name. The friars built it between 1603 and 1611 and dedicated it to St Jerome; the interior was filled out later in baroque taste. On its gallery stands the organ Johann Wöckherl completed in 1642, the oldest playable instrument in the city — reason enough for the sacred and choral music that continues to be sung under these vaults.