Gerald Wheeler was born in 1929 in England. He studied piano, organ, theory and composition at the Royal College of Music, London, where his teachers included Harold Darke and Herbert Howells. He graduated in 1952 with diplomas in piano performance and teaching, and in 1956 received a Fellowship of the Royal College of Organists. In 1996 he was awarded an honorary Doctorate in Theology by the Diocesan Theological College in Montreal.

In 1953 he was appointed sub-organist of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, and was in charge of all music during the cathedral choir’s post-coronation tour of the U.S.A. and Canada. In 1956 he accepted the position of organist at St. Matthew’s, a large Anglican parish church in Ottawa, Ontario. He remained there for 9 ½ years before being appointed director of music at Christ Church Anglican Cathedral in Montreal, Quebec, a post he held for 31 years. During that time he founded and directed a Men and Boys’ Choir, a professional mixed choir, and a girls’ choir, as well as conducting performances of Handel’s Messiah and Bach’s B Minor Mass in addition to many requiem masses and other large musical works. He played with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra and the McGill Chamber Orchestra for more than 20 years.

In 1996 he accepted the position of Director of Music at St. Francis by the Sea Episcopal Church in Blue Hill, Maine, where he directed a choir of 15 singers and oversaw the installation in 2001 of a new 2-manual tracker organ built by Karl Wilhelm, Inc. of St Hilaire, Quebec, who had built the organ at the Cathedral in Montreal. Dr Wheeler served as interim organist at St. Paul’s Church ‘K’ Street, in Washington, D.C. in January 1998 where he directed a full music program involving three choirs and where he returned in March 2000 for a further three months. Other recent interim positions have included 4 months in 2003 at St Paul’s Cathedral in Buffalo, NY, and 4 months in 2005 at Christ Episcopal Church, Wenham, Mass.

Dr. Wheeler still maintains a very busy recital schedule. In June and July of 1999 he played ten recitals in the U.K., including two in Oxford, Trinity College, Cambridge, and two at the cathedrals of Portsmouth and Brecon. He returned to the U.K. in 2001 to play three recitals in the south of England, and the Saint Saens’ Organ Symphony in Brecon Cathedral, Wales. In December 2000 he traveled to Bejing, China, as accompanist to the countertenor Daniel Taylor. Dr Wheeler continues to play with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra occasionally, most recently for a 2003 performance at Carnegie Hall.

Dr Wheeler has been the Music Director at Blue Hill Congregational Church since October 2005.