No garland required: Katharine McPhee gets spirited for Christmas

And she did it with nary a plastic reindeer in sight.

“I figured I’m still going to have to sing these songs whether there is garland in the studio or not,” McPhee said last week from her home in Los Angeles -- noting that since she is a California native, she’s already used to surf-weather Christmases.

For the next few weeks, McPhee’s life will revolve around promoting the album with a series of tree-lighting appearances -- including Thanksgiving Day at the Macy’s at Lenox Square mall.

Since McPhee achieved noteworthy success with a handful of seasonal tunes released since 2007 -- her recording of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” passed a half-million downloads on iTunes last year -- it’s more logical than it might appear that her third studio effort is a niche record.

The singer, who graduated from “Idol” in 2006 as runner-up to Taylor Hicks, said as soon as her record label, Verve, approached her about a holiday album, she quickly started to make a list of her favorite songs.

Her 30 choices were whittled down once she got near a piano to feel which would work.

Among the discards was one of her favorites -- Celine Dion’s “Don’t Save It All for Christmas Day.”

“I just couldn’t make it different,” McPhee said. “I kept hearing her voice. If you’re going to do a song by Celine, you need to make it so different or unique and I couldn’t.”

What she could do, though, was recast “Jingle Bells” with invigorating gospel flair and resurrect Billy Squier’s 1981 MTV gem, which became the title of her album.

When told that she doesn’t seem like an obvious Squier fan, McPhee, 26, laughed and said, “I didn’t even know who he was. I was either 1 or negative 1 when the song came out. My musical director Doug Petty said he wanted to play me a song on YouTube and that it could be in the feel-good vein of Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You.’ I instantly became engaged in it. I thought, it’s the perfect title and just a fun, feel-good song.”

McPhee also wound up co-writing a new song for the album, the lovely “It’s Not Christmas Without You,” which, like Carey’s “All I Want,” sounds like a classic even though it’s original.

Petty receives credit for that creation, too.

“I had no intention of writing an original song,” McPhee said, “but we were in the studio and Doug started playing these gorgeous chords and I started singing melodies over it and that was it -- a couple of hours later, we had a full-blown song.”

For now, McPhee's life is about promoting the holiday album, but fans will see a saucier side of her next summer at the movies.

McPhee is co-starring in “Shark Night 3D” as Beth, a character covered in tattoos and piercings -- a bit of a detour from the singer’s long-standing image as a glamorous, model-pretty good girl.

Naturally, McPhee relished the on-screen 180.

"I liked playing the rebellious type, though I probably didn't go as extreme as the character was written," she said. "Beth is definitely sexually advanced, and whatever is on her mind, she says. It was fun for me to play the naughty girl, though it is PG-13, so it's not too naughty."

McPhee also might star in a romantic comedy for ABC Family in the spring and plans to return to the studio for a possible fourth album by the end of 2011.

Oh, and of course, there is the requisite hair update.

After going Marilyn Monroe-blond for the release of last year’s “Unbroken” album, McPhee is now sporting a short, dark coif.

Did life feel different with a platinum shag?

“It definitely did the first few weeks. I dressed different, my makeup was different," she said, "but now, I’m back to my brunette self.”

Event preview

The Macy’s Great Tree 2010 with musical performances by Katharine McPhee, Chuck Wicks, Bobby V and Austin Renfroe. Free. 6-8 p.m. Nov. 25. Macy’s at Lenox Square mall, 3393 Peachtree Road N.E., Atlanta. 404-231-2800, www.macys.com.