Posted by The St. Stephen’s Basilica in the centre of Budapest is the great church of the city. It is in the centre of Pest, unlike the other famous church of Budapest (the Matthias Church at the top of the castle in Buda on the other side of the Danube).
Tickets for Budapest’s main church are available online with and without the dome (around 8 euros or 19 euros when purchased online). There are also guided tours of St. Stephen’s Basilica for 15 euros including admission. You can buy such tickets on the well-known website Getyourguide: Link to Getyourguide
Very famous is the great organ of St. Stephen’s Basilica Budapest. Weekly organ concerts take place, which, despite the large capacity of the church, are often sold out. Also many Budapest tourists come to the organ concerts. A great experience. One should book in advance. >>> On this link you can buy a ticket on the internet.
In the mighty St. Stephans Church there is room for 8000 people. It was only built a good 100 years ago and was completed in 1905. 96 metres high, the dome is particularly impressive. It is exactly as high as the dome of the Parliament of Budapest. At that time this was supposed to symbolize the balanced power between church and state. The church was finished in the neo-renaissance style and is today a great tourist attraction.Visitors can climb the dome or take an elevator to the top for great views over Budapest. The climb involves about 364 steps, but the views of the Danube, the Hungarian Parliament and Buda Castle are worth the effort.
As a visitor of Budapest, the interior of the church can be visited free of charge. At the entrance there is a sign that a small donation of approximately one Euro is expected, but not all church visitors pay this. As a first-time visitor, one is first amazed by the gigantic size of the St. Stephen Basilica Budapest.
Tickets for Budapest’s main church are available online with and without the dome (around 8 euros or 19 euros if purchased online). There are also guided tours of St. Stephen’s Basilica for 15 euros including admission. You can buy such tickets on the well-known website Getyourguide: Link to Getyourguide
The tickets on Getyourguide are so-called skip-the-line tickets. If you buy the internet tickets, you don’t have to stand in the often extremely long line at the church’s ticket office; you go to a special counter especially for visitors with these online tickets.
The highlight for many Hungarians who visit the main church in Budapest is the right hand of the first king of Hungary, Stephen I (969 to 1038). The embalmed hand can be seen as a relic in St. Stephen’s Basilica. This relic is displayed in a richly decorated glass case and is an important place of pilgrimage for Hungarians.
The interior of St. Stephen’s Basilica is richly decorated with gold accents, mosaics and elaborate marble details. The central dome is particularly impressive and shows religious works of art that symbolize important elements of Christianity.
The colorful stained glass windows add to the splendor of the basilica and create a beautiful play of colors in the interior, especially in daylight.
This organ was built by the famous organ building company Rieger from Austria and is known for its magnificent sound and high quality of construction. The organ has 4 manuals and more than 8,000 pipes, giving it an enormous variety of timbres.
The organ of St. Stephen’s Basilica is a pneumatic organ, which means that the pipes are powered by compressed air. This type of organ construction allows for very precise control of the sound production and ensures a particularly clear and resonant sound. The organ has a total of 110 registers that can be played in various combinations to produce different timbres.
Each register of the organ has its own characteristic sound, and by combining the different registers the organist can create a variety of soundscapes. The organ is capable of handling both solo passages and complex, multi-layered musical structures.
Very famous is the great organ of St. Stephen’s Basilica Budapest. Weekly organ concerts take place, which are often sold out despite the large capacity of the church. Also many Budapest tourists come to the organ concerts. A great experience. One should book in advance. >>> On this link you can buy a ticket on the internet.
The catholic cathedral St. Stephen’s Basilica is a so-called concathedral (co-cathedral). The actual main church of the archbishopric of Esztergom-Budapest is the Basilica of Esztergom, a town north of Budapest on the Danube and on the border to Slovakia, which is also worth seeing.