For Bertold Hummel, making music at Christmas was a matter of course throughout his life. Whether as a boy singer in his father's school choir, as a cantor in his Freiburg parish, as a cellist or as a happy family man at the piano, he always enjoyed helping to organise this celebration. As a composer, he enjoyed dressing up the old Christmas carols in a new guise time and again. This resulted in numerous compositions ranging from simple choral pieces to chamber and orchestral music to the great choral fantasia "O du fröhliche Weihnachtszeit" for 2 choirs, 4 organs and trumpets.