The song was first performed on Christmas Eve 1818 at St Nicholas parish church in Oberndorf, a village in the Austrian Empire on the Salzach river in present-day Austria. A young priest, Father Joseph Mohr, had come to Oberndorf the year before. He had written the lyrics of the song “Stille Nacht” in 1816 at Mariapfarr, the hometown of his father in the Salzburg Lungau region, where Joseph had worked as a co-adjutor.
The melody was composed by Franz Xaver Gruber, schoolmaster and organist in the nearby village of Arnsdorf. Before Christmas Eve, Mohr brought the words to Gruber and asked him to compose a melody and guitar accompaniment for the Christmas Eve mass, after river flooding had damaged the church organ. It is unknown what inspired Mohr to write the lyrics, or what prompted him to create a new carol.
The Silent Night Chapel (Stille-Nacht-Kapelle) is located in the town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg in the Austrian province of Salzburg, and is a monument to the Christmas carol Silent Night and its librettist, Joseph Mohr and its composer, Franz Xaver Gruber. It stands on the site of the former St Nicholas’s Church, where on 24 December 1818 the Christmas carol was performed for the first time.
Every 24th of December, at 17:00 (5:00 p.m.), a solemn memorial mass is held at the church and guests thrill to the experience of hearing the famous carol sung in their many languages. Since 2002, this celebration has been transmitted by means of the local webcam on the Internet. (LINK)
