The titles of seven individual character pieces reflect aspects of World War I and Christian feasts.

Reger was raised Catholic but was fascinated by the variety of melodies of Protestant hymns, and used quotations from them throughout his life.

He wrote numbers 1–3 in July 1915,[1] then additionally, on a request by the publisher,[2] 4–6 in October 1915, and the final 7th in February and March 1916.

[1] in 1900 Reger commented to his friend, the organist Gustav Beckmann, on the commonly held view of the difficulty of his organ works: "Meine Orgelsachen sind schwer, es gehört ein über die Technik souverän herrschender geistvoller Spieler dazu" (My organ pieces are difficult; they need a skillful player who masters the technique).

In June 1916 a review in the Süddeutsche Zeitung described Trauerode, the first of the seven pieces, as "ein rhapsodisch angelegtes Werk voll ernster, grüblerischer Fragen und banger Klagen, das sich aufwiegt zu dem trostreichen, wie Sphärenklang ertönenden Choral" (a rhapsodic piece full of serious brooding questions and sounds of distress, which are balanced by the consoling and other-worldly music of the chorale).

1 Trauerode (Ode of mourning) to the memory of those who fell in the 1914/1915 war ("Dem Gedenken der im Kriege 1914/15 Gefallenen") and No.

The musicologist Christopher Anderson comments that "the acceptance of divine will in the first is answered by praise of the omnipotent God in the second, a commentary on the sacrifice of war in a Job-like perspective.

7, Siegesfeier, includes the chorale "Nun danket alle Gott" before embarking on the patriotic "Deutschlandlied" (adopted as the German national anthem after 1922).