There isn’t another holiday that focuses so much on music as Christmas. Fortunately, there are plenty of country Christmas songs to help celebrate the season, including these three classics, all from the 1980s.
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“Who Is This Babe” by The Judds
“Who Is This Babe” is on The Judds’ 1987 Christmas Time With The Judds album. The project includes classics like “Silver Bells”, “Away In A Manger”, “O Holy Night”, and more. But it also includes “Who Is This Babe,” an original song written by Don Potter.
“Who Is This Babe” says, “Shepherds were watching out under the sky / When the star over Bethlehem lit up the night / He’s the light in the darkness, a gift from above / He is held with the spirit of God’s holy love.”
“Christmas In Dixie” by Alabama
In 1985, Alabama released Alabama Christmas, a ten-track record of songs. In addition to “Christmas In Dixie”, the album also had “Joseph And Mary’s Boy”, written by Keith Whitley and Don Cook, and “Tennessee Christmas” by Amy Grant and Gary Chapman, among others.
The four members of Alabama at the time, Randy Owen, Teddy Gentry, Jeff Cook, and Mark Herndon, wrote “Christmas In Dixie”. The song says, “It’s windy in Chicago, the kids are out of school / There’s magic in Motown, the city’s on the move / In Jackson, Mississippi to Charlotte, Caroline And all across the nation, it’s a peaceful Christmas time / Christmas in Dixie, it’s snowing in the pines / Merry Christmas from Dixie to everyone tonight.”
“Christmas In Dixie” became a Top 35 hit for Alabama. In 2024, Chris Janson recorded a new version with the legendary band.
“The Greatest Gift Of All” by Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers
In 1984, Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers teamed up for their collaborative Once Upon A Christmas record. The album includes the title track, a song that Parton wrote by herself.
“Once Upon A Christmas” begins with Rogers speaking the opening lines. The song says in part, “Once upon a Christmas in a manger far away / A King was born, His palace was a manger filled with hay / His royal robe was swaddling cloth, a halo was His crown / Once upon a Christmas away in Bethlehem / And all the world rejoiced because the King was born at last / A savior had been promised, now it had come to pass / And the joyful news that He was born spread quickly far and wide / Once upon a Christmas was the birth of Jesus Christ.“
In 2020, Parton released A Holly Dolly Christmas. But she says it’s Once Upon A Christmas that she still listens to every holiday season.
Photo by Ron Galella/Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images
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