The wooden church of the Epiphany of the Lord was built on the site of the former Prolom Gates of the settlement in the 17th century. In its honor, the New Sloboda, developed along Prolomnaya Street, became known as the Bogoyavlenskaya Sloboda.

In 1701, a church dedicated to Andrew the First-Called was built next to the Epiphany Church.

In 1731 and 1756, thanks to merchants Ivan Afanasyevich Mikhlayev and Sergey Alexandrovich Chernov, a stone Epiphany Church and a tented bell tower were constructed. It is known that in 1741 the church suffered greatly from a fire, leaving only the walls intact. It is possible that the construction of the stone church began after this incident. The completion of the construction is dated to 1756, when a refectory was added to the church, significantly increasing its volume.

Thus, in the 18th century, an architectural complex of the Epiphany Church was formed, including the main church, the winter church of Andrew the First-Called on the northern side, a two-tiered bell tower with a tented top on what is now Oстровского Street, a clergy house on the western side, and another house facing Bolshaya Prolomnaya Street, where the monument to Shalyapin now stands.

Before the revolution, the parish of the Epiphany Church was one of the largest in Kazan. Among the parishioners were not only ordinary townspeople but also aristocrats and large entrepreneurs.

By 1917, the complex included three churches: the main cold church in honor of the Epiphany of the Lord with a chapel of Saint Stephen, the warm church of Andrew the First-Called with a chapel of the Holy Martyrs Michael of Chernigov and Fyodor, as well as a cold single-altar church established in 1902 on the second tier of the new bell tower in memory of the third finding of the head of John the Baptist.

During the Soviet era, from 1920 to 1935, the Epiphany Church served as the city cathedral. In the 1930s, the church of Andrew the First-Called was demolished, and a zoo was located on its site until a residential building for the Kazan Fur Association was built in the 1950s.

After the main church was closed, its premises were used as a warehouse, and the bell tower housed shops and an optical workshop.

In the 1950s, the Epiphany Church was repurposed as a sports hall for Kazan State University, leading to significant changes: the decor was plastered over, and the domes were destroyed.

In 1960, the bell tower of the Epiphany Cathedral received the status of a protected architectural monument of local significance. It was repaired in 1973.

In 1995, the Epiphany Cathedral was included in the list of objects of historical and cultural heritage of federal significance as a monument of urban planning and architecture.

In 1996 and 1997, the Epiphany Cathedral was returned to the Russian Orthodox Church, and since then, daily services have been held there.

The bell tower remained under the management of the Ministry of Culture of Tatarstan and is used as an exhibition hall for ancient Russian art of the State Museum of Fine Arts of the Republic of Tatarstan. In 2001, a chamber Shalyapin Hall was opened in the bell tower.