I've often been asked about what it was like growing up around music, both by strangers and friends. I am still trying to figure it out myself, both its impact on me as a musician and its impact on me as a person. I think there are two points of influence, music at home and music as my father's job.

When artists are typecast as dreamy, head-in-the-clouds free spirits, someone is missing the mark. The work requires clarity of vision, iron-like determination, and laser-beam focus from its creator. Perhaps this is why arranging music can be such an oasis for me. The hardest part has mostly been done.

When Canadian crooner Vincent Wolfe covered Frank Sinatra's "Come Dance With Me" at a Toronto venue last month, he probably didn't expect it to be tak...