A year after the church was consecrated (1823), the vestry arranged for an “organ screen” to be constructed though it did not yet have an organ.

By spring 1824 they may have acquired the rented pipe organ mentioned in later Vestry Minutes since they approved the Music Fund Society’s request to use the church for the performance of Haydn’s Oratorio of the Creation, which includes an organ.

The contract with St. Stephen’s was for $2175 and was fully paid by March 1827, following an apparently “late opening” of the organ in July 1826. Unfortunately, we still know little about that opening and who played. I don’t see any reference to a salaried organist until March 1833, when Mr. “Darly” (W.H.W. Darley [1810-1872], organist-composer now known mainly for his choral work), requested a salary increase.

The Hall & Erben’s voice filled St. Stephen’s until 1864, when it was transferred to the chapel of an ambitious new project for the church, the Burd Orphan Asylum just built in West Philadelphia. It is not clear what happened to this inaugural pipe organ when the institution moved to 4226 Baltimore Avenue in the 1920s and the original property sold (it is now defunct).

The 1825 Hall & Erben was replaced in 1864 by a new pipe organ by W.B.D. Simmons of Boston, possibly with input from St. Stephen’s new, eminent organist, David D. Wood.
-- from church history web site