Singing your grandfather's music shouldn't be a career plan, but he turned it into a $1.5 million-a-night one.
At a glance
- Known for
- Crooner behind *Christmas*, five Grammy wins, 75 million records sold
- Before fame
- His grandfather traded plumbing work for his stage time at nightclubs
- Off-screen
- Co-owns the Vancouver Giants and built a hockey rink before his house
Rise to Fame
A plumber in Burnaby traded pipe repairs for his teenage grandson's stage time at local nightclubs. That grandfather, Demetrio Santagà, had introduced him to jazz through a record collection heavy on Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald, and he wasn't about to let the obsession go to waste.
The nightclub circuit led nowhere for a decade. Three independent albums, zero label interest. Most singers with that record end up selling real estate. A corporate gig in 2000 caught the ear of an aide to former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, who passed his CD along. He got booked for the Mulroney daughter's wedding, and when he heard David Foster was on the guest list, he waived his fee. Foster signed him to 143 Records, and It's Time (2005) sold over 10 million copies. The plumber's investment paid off.
In the Spotlight
Every November, the internet posts the same joke: he's being defrosted. His Christmas album has sold over 15 million copies. Nothing in UK holiday sales this century has come close. He initially called the meme "not funny." Now he calls it "the biggest compliment in the world." Owning a holiday is better than owning a genre.
His pivot to television landed harder than anyone expected. He joined The Voice in 2024 and won both his first two seasons, which almost no coach in the show's history has done. Nobody predicted the tuxedo crooner would be that good at spotting raw talent. Five Grammys, all in the same category. Tours averaging $1.5 million a night. The calendar does his marketing for him.
Side Notes
The mansion in Burnaby sits across from his former elementary school. It has 15 bathrooms, but the first thing he built was the full-size hockey rink in the basement. The rink went in before the walls went up, which tells you everything about where his head is at.
He co-owns the Vancouver Giants, a junior hockey team, and has reportedly called it his "most prestigious" accomplishment. He gets on recruiting calls with players and their parents, not just writing checks. His three-year-old son Noah developed hepatoblastoma in 2016. He cancelled his world tour, disappeared for a year, and came back to the exact same lane. The comeback album didn't try to reinvent anything. He doesn't do reinvention.