I find when I try to find out the authorship and history of many "classic" Christmas carols, I get discrepant information as I look at more and more reference sites or sheet music.

One of the carols with the most disputed authorship and history is "Joy To The World."   No one seems to dispute that Isaac Watts 'wrote' the lyrics (or adapted them from Psalm 98) in 1719 or thereabouts.   But some sources say he "wrote" the SONG (original title: "The Messiah's Coming And Kingdom") and that either G. F. Handel wrote the music or that James Lowell Mason set Watts's poem to music or "arranged" Watts's words AND music in 1922 (or a bit later).    Some sources say Mason borrowed music from Handel's "Messiah" for his tune, but others say Handel had nothing to do with the music other than being someone Mason greatly admired and mentioned in a footnote.


Similarly, there are various versions of the story of how "Stille Nacht" came to be written (and why).   I still see Silent Night attributed fairly often as "Traditional," even though I thought it was established historical fact that Franz Grüber wrote the music (for the guitar) and Joseph Mohr wrote the original German lyrics.

"Away In A Manger" is often called "Luther's hymn" or "Luther's carol," and some say Martin Luther wrote the lyrics, but other sources say he had nothing to do with composing that song.

These are just a few examples of popular Christmas hymns (carols) thats seem to have authorship or other aspects of their history cited discrepantly from one source to another.

I'll focus on "Joy To The World" to start, but I welcome input and discussions about other carols too.

G