Arranging Pieces/Songs and Apadting Styles...

[silvaone]

Hi all

I recently bought a DVD of ''Ray Charles celebrates a Gospel Christmas'' and the gospel/christmas songs he sings, he has arranged them in a jazz/R&B style and I've been wondering for some time....

what is the process of arranging and adapting a style?

Are there any books on the subject? Is it just a matter of chord changes - how is this possible? is it also structure changes? Again how does this not make a huge difference to the resulting arrangement? Because even though he has adapted the songs in his own way they sound similar (obviously) but it seems odd to be to be able to do this?

thanks for any info

- Silva