The album includes a revised version of the duo's signature Christmas song, "
Merry Christmas Darling", featuring re-recorded vocals by Karen Carpenter (done at her request). It also includes one of two versions of "
Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town". A slower version of "Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town", recorded in 1974, as well as other unused songs recorded during this album's sessions, were issued on the Carpenters' 1984 Christmas album,
An Old-Fashioned Christmas.
Album artwork The original album cover by Robert Tanenbaum is modeled on
Norman Rockwell's 1960 painting "
Triple Self-Portrait", done as a cover for
The Saturday Evening Post.
Reissues The standard CD version of
Christmas Portrait, first issued in 1984, is a "Special Edition" compendium of selected tracks from the Carpenters' two Christmas albums into one 70-minute program, with tracks from each interspersed in the running order;
"Ave Maria" was remixed at this time in order to include a choral track that vanished in 1978 and was later found. A CD of the original LP content was briefly issued exclusively in
West Germany around the same time. In 1996, a two-CD set titled
Christmas Collection was issued internationally, containing
Christmas Portrait and
An Old-Fashioned Christmas together with their original respective track listings. ==Commercial performance==