[image id="9259" title="michael martin murphey" class="size-medium wp-image-19840" width="288" height="300" ] Michael Martin Murphey returns to Corpus Christi for the ninth Cowboy Christmas Ball.

KICK UP YOUR HEELS DEC. 8 AT THE COWBOY CHRISTMAS BALL — Keeping alive the spirit of the first Cowboy Christmas Ball, Michael Martin Murphey performs his Cowboy Christmas concert at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 8, at the Performing Arts Center at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. The “singing cowboy poet" will, as usual, be accompanied by the Rio Grande Band for this ninth year of bringing the cowboy holiday tradition to the Coastal Bend region. Murphey celebrates the 20th anniversary of the Cowboy Christmas Ball with this 2013 tour.

“The first time I came to the annual 'Cowboy Christmas Ball' in Anson, Texas, I was floored that the community had worked so hard to keep it going,” Murphey said. Anson has celebrated the holidays with this event each year since 1934. “I fell in love watching the older couples dance and the dances being passed on to the younger people. It reconnected me to the tradition.”

The show is modeled after the Christmas experiences of native New Yorker Larry Chittenden in Anson in 1885. He commemorated that special holiday by composing the six-stanza verses of "The Cowboys' Christmas Ball."

Murphey took the celebration on the road 20 years ago, performing the ball in venues across the nation.

"The Cowboy Christmas Ball is steeped in everything I hold dear of growing up in Texas at Christmas time,” Murphey said.  “All the old dances are here — the waltzes, the mazurkas, the Paul Jones, the Virginia Reel — all these dances are still done here. The women make their own costumes and clothes, and the men still wear string ties and frock coats. It’s a family reunion of friends.”

Reserved-seat tickets range from $26 to $36 with $7 tickets for children and students with A&M-Corpus Christi IDs (in select areas.) Tickets are available anytime at tamucc.tix.com or by calling (361) 825-ARTS (2787). Box-office hours are 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Monday-Friday. Discounts are available only in person at the box office for Texas A&M-Corpus Christi faculty/staff/students with SandDollars ID.

“This is my favorite season of the year,” Murphey said. “We remember our fathers and mothers. We celebrate our children, and we treasure our friends and the many blessing given by our Lord. It really brings out the very best in all of us."