Spreckels Organ Pavilion

On our lists of the best live music venues and activities in San Diego.

An open-air pavilion in Balboa Park holds the largest outdoor pipe organ in the world, more than 5,000 pipes ranging from twelve inches to thirty-two feet, built in 1915 and given to the city by the Spreckels brothers under a deed that requires every concert to stay free. A civic organist has played a free Sunday concert here since 1917, one hour at 2 p.m. every week of the year regardless of weather, and the International Summer Organ Festival adds Monday evening shows from July through early September. The structure itself is an ornately vaulted, open-air pavilion with carved gables framing the pipes.