Caption
Visser-Rowland Associates of Houston builds organs primarily with mechanical action. Their tonal designs lean toward the north European ‘neo-Baroque’ style. The firm has built some organs of substantial size, including those in St Anne’s Catholic Church, Houston (1981), St Luke’s Episcopal Church, San Antonio, Texas (1982) and the First Presbyterian Church, Stamford, Connecticut (1991). When this magnificent organ in Bates Hall at the University of Texas in Austin was built in 1983, it was the largest tracker action organ in the US. There is a direct mechanical connection between the keys and the pipes, not an electrical connection. The organ has 99 ranks, 5,315 pipes, 5 divisions, 4 manuals, and 67 stops.