Wheatley is said to have studied in New York, Paris and Milano (with Anselmi, among others) and to have made his debut at Covent
Garden as Turiddu. He did sing Turiddu there in June and July 1907; the first performance on June 8th may have been his stage
debut, but certainly not his absolute debut since he already gave a concert in Cologne in 1906.
Wheatley spent the years from 1908 to 1911 as a lead tenor with the touring Carl Rosa Opera Company throughout the United Kingdom.
In Scotland, for instance, where he was much more successful than at Covent Garden by the way, he appeared in those four years as
Phoebus de Chateaupers (in Esmeralda by Arthur Goring Thomas), Manrico, Gounod's Faust, Thaddeus (The Bohemian girl),
Don Caesar de Bazan (Maritana by Wallace), Lohengrin, Don Alvaro, Wilhelm Meister, Turiddu, Assad (Die Königin von
Saba by Goldmark), and Don José.
At least from 1914, he was back to his native USA, singing with the Century Opera Company. At one point, he was arrested for a
pretty bizarre reason:
New York Times, 29 April 1915
Last notices on his career are from 1919, when he made a long tour of Australia and New Zealand, with mixed success.
Reference 1: The Graphic, 15 June 1907; reference 2; reference 3 and picture source (top); reference 4 and picture source
(bottom): Festival of Music, playbill, Peru (Nebraska), 4 June 1917; reference 5: The Bulletin, 21 August 1919; reference 6: New
Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, 13 November 1919
