Harold Wheeler, the Tony Award-winning Broadway orchestrator, composer and conductor who served as musical director for 17 seasons of ABC’s Dancing With the Stars, died Wednesday, June 24, at his home in Los Angeles following a lengthy illness. He was 82. His death was confirmed by Broadway producer and longtime family friend Lamar Richardson.
Born William Harold Wheeler Jr. on July 14, 1943, in St. Louis, Missouri, Wheeler began playing piano at age five at Antioch Baptist Church, whose congregation included Chuck Berry and Ike and Tina Turner. He attended Howard University before earning his master’s degree in music from the Manhattan School of Music in 1968.
His professional career began in the 1960s when he was hired as musical director for Burt Bacharach, a position widely credited as the first of its kind at a major pop act to be held by a Black man. The job led to his Broadway debut in 1968 with Promises, Promises, launching a stage career that would span more than three decades and 31 productions. Among his most celebrated work were the orchestrations for The Wiz and Dreamgirls, along with credits on Two Gentlemen of Verona, Little Me, The Tap Dance Kid, Leader of the Pack, Carrie, The Life, Side Show, The Full Monty, Hairspray, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Lennon and Ain’t Too Proud. He received Tony nominations for orchestrations on The Life, Little Me, Swing!, The Full Monty, Hairspray and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and was honored with a Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theater in 2019. He also received a Drama Desk Award for outstanding orchestrations for Hairspray in 2003 and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the NAACP Theatre Awards in 2008.
Beyond Broadway, Wheeler arranged and produced music for Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, Nina Simone, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, B.B. King, Smokey Robinson, Al Green and Dizzy Gillespie, among many others. He played piano on Bruce Springsteen’s Blinded By the Light and Spirit In the Night from the 1973 album Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. In 1996 he conducted the opening and closing ceremonies of the Summer Olympics, and in 2004 he became only the second Black conductor in Academy history to lead the Oscar ceremony, serving as music conductor for the 76th Academy Awards before returning as music arranger for the 79th. He also composed music for the soap opera All My Children across more than 1,200 episodes.
Wheeler joined Dancing With the Stars in 2006 after a last-minute cancellation of the Broadway-bound musical Lennon freed up six weeks in his schedule. His 28-piece orchestra and vocal ensemble became a defining element of the show for 17 seasons before ABC controversially shifted toward recorded music, leading to Wheeler’s departure. Ray Chew succeeded him as the show’s musical director.
At Howard University, Wheeler met his wife, actress Hattie Winston, known for Becker, The Electric Company and Rugrats, when he served as her substitute music teacher. The two later appeared together in the 1971 Broadway production of Two Gentlemen of Verona before marrying. He is survived by Winston, their daughters Marian and Samantha, and his grandchildren.