Twenty years after singing the somber Ring Them Bells, he has attached them to a sleigh, painted them silver and given them a jolly jingle.Bob Dylan\'s first holiday collection, Christmas in the Heart (* * * ½ out of four), arrives today with 15 hymns, chestnuts and popular Santa songs. He couldn\'t sound more sentimental or sincere.Yes, that Bob. Many initially greeted word of a Dylan Christmas album with disbelief, derision or suspicion, then adjusted to the news with expectations of blasphemy and Scrooge-like acerbity. Instead we get the Ebenezer of Dickens\' denouement: open-hearted, ebullient and drunk on the spirit of the season. Dylan isn\'t rocking around the Christmas tree. Nor does he snow listeners by slapdashing through a few hokey carols. His habit of exploring pop\'s roots resumes as In the Heart revisits yuletide styles popularized by Nat King Cole, Mel Tormé, the Ray Conniff Singers and — follow the bouncing ball! —Mitch Miller. Dylan, who produced under his longtime (and now apt) pseudonym Jack Frost, is joined by his touring band, seven backup singers and three guest players, notably Los Lobos\' David Hidalgo. Avoiding his latter-day earthy blues, Dylan dresses holly-jolly tunes in bells, chimes and celesta, nestling his unmistakable croak in clouds of harmony vocals. The album\'s curious art telegraphs Dylan\'s intentions. The cover\'s Currier & Ives facsimile announces the music\'s nostalgic bent, and depictions of three wise men and Bettie Page in a scandalous Santa suit insinuate moods of devotion and cheer.Engaging and earnest, Dylan evokes Gene Autry on a jaunty Here Comes Santa Claus and radiates warmth on Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Serving up the opening verse of O Come All Ye Faithful (Adeste Fideles) in Latin, his craggy vocals betray a graceful reverence. Little Drummer Boy is delivered tenderly in a relaxed croon, and his tenor finds a smooth groove on The Christmas Song.Sheer fun takes over on Must Be Santa, a brisk, accordion-pumped polka, and the Hawaiian-kissed Christmas Island.If there\'s anything weirder than Dylan releasing a Christmas disc, it\'s that he avoided doing so during a recording career spanning 47 years and 46 releases. Snowy sets, lucrative for their perennial sales potential, have become an all-genres staple.Dylan will donate his royalties in perpetuity to three charities that aid the hungry: Feeding America, the U.K.-based Crisis and the United Nations\' World Food Programme. If that isn\'t Christmas in the heart, what is?
