Trisha Yearwood says a little bit of nervous energy is a good thing—but she also admitted to barely sleeping the night before taping the CMA Country Christmas special earlier this fall. Don't worry, she has a secret trick for handling it.

This is the first time the "Every Girl In This Town" singer has hosted the show—or, actually, anything aside from her own cooking show. That experience proved to be more helpful than any of her live musical performances, she shared with Taste of Country and select media prior to the show. On one hand that seems counterintuitive: Wouldn't her extensive practice singing and entertaining for a large audience be more helpful than staring into a camera on a television set?

Not necessarily. “I’m an introvert, which is hard to probably believe," she says. "So singing in front of an audience, and talking in front of an audience is something I had to learn to be comfortable doing. The cooking show has really helped me, because it’s not scripted.”

Yearwood will be on stage a lot on Tuesday night's (Dec. 3) ABC broadcast (9PM ET). CMA Country Christmas finds her hosting and performing on four separate occasions.

A medley of classics will begin the show. "Feliz Navidad" will close it. And that suits her, she shares.

“I like mixing traditional songs that everybody knows with newer songs," she explains. "I used to think nobody wants to hear my version of ‘Jingle Bells’ because everyone has done one, but then you realize you kind of do want to hear everybody’s version of these songs.”

One big difference between this show and her own concerts is the stop-and-start nature of television filming. It's during those awkward pauses her anxiety will be put to the test. To battle it, the 55-year-old singer (and wife to Garth Brooks) says she'll pick out someone younger than her who looks nervous, and go up to him or her and try to make them not nervous.

“They don’t realize that it’s helping me, but I’m just trying to help them," she says.

Pictures from the show reveal that she figured it out pretty well for TV in 2019. Also slated to appear during the 10th anniversary of CMA Country Christmas is Kristin Chenoweth, For King & Country, Chris Janson, Tori Kelly, Lady AntebellumRascal FlattsRunaway June, CeCe Winans, Brett Young and Chris Young.

Get a Sneak Peek of CMA Country Christmas 2019:

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