Who was the composer of the Christmas...

Franz Gruber, an Austrian composer from a village in the Tyrol, wrote the music, and Father Joseph Mohr, the village priest, wrote the words. The song was first performed at a Christmas service in 1818. Over the years, its fame spread throughout the world, but neither man enjoyed the work’s success. Father Mohr died penniless in 1848, and Gruber lived in obscurity and died in poverty in 1863.