Rev. Timothy Wright

As a biography, Pastor Timothy Wright was born in Brooklyn, New York on June 17, 1947. He was also known as Timothy D. Wright. He was married for 37 years to Betty J. Wright, variously known as Betty Wright. The couple had five children, Danny Wright, David Wright, Derrick Wright, Dwayne Wright and Donny Wright.

As a gospel music singer, musician and composer, he was known as the Godfather of Gospel. He had a powerful baritone voice and utilized mass choirs in songs that were frequently uptempo praise songs. He got his start at age 12, playing piano at his church and composing songs. He became music director of Washington Temple Church of God in Christ in Brooklyn, New York while still in his early 20s.

By 1969, Wright was playing piano for the late Bishop F.D. Washington, and it was from his tenure in Washington's choir that Wright gained the attention of Rev. Isaac Douglas and the N.Y. Community Choir, for which Wright soon began playing organ for, as well as penning almost all the songs on Douglas' 1971 album Lets Go Higher. In the mid-'70s, Wright formed his own outfit, the Timothy Wright Concert Choir, resulting in such releases as Who's on the Lord's Side and Do You Know the Light, and began playing with various other choirs across the United States. Wright also found the time to team up with Myrna Summers for her We're Gonna Make It release, as well as forming the project Come Thou Almighty King, which is comprised of a 500-voice choir.

He began his own choir in 1976, the Timothy Wright Concert Choir, which produced several hit songs including “You Must Come In at the Door,” “Troubles Don’t Last Always,” and “Who’s on the Lord’s Side?” Pastor Timothy Wright’s most recent album was the 2007 “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,” whose title track’s focus is the victims of of Hurricane Katrina and was recorded live with the New York Fellowship Mass Choir. Throughout his career, Rev. Timothy Wright recorded 19 gospel albums.

The 1994 album, Come Thou Almighty King, which Timothy Wright recorded with the New York Fellowship Mass Choir, reached the Billboard Top 20 Gospel Albums chart and received a Grammy Award nomination for best traditional soul gospel album. In 1999, he received another Grammy Award nomination in that category for Been There Done That, recorded with the B/J Mass Choir, featuring Myrna Summers.

Rev. Timothy Wright was pastor at the Grace Tabernacle Church of God in Christ in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York with his wife serving as a co-pastor. It was a church which he had started and served as pastor for 18 years.

On July 4, 2008, as Reverend Timothy Wright and his wife, and Co-Pastor Evangelist Betty J. Wright and their grandson D.J. Wright were returning from a church conference in Detroit when a drunk driver hit them head-on Interstate 80 in Greene Township in north central Pennsylvania, approximately 200 miles west of New York City, Wright’s wife and grandson were killed in the car crash. Police identified the driver as John Pick, 44, of Lewisburg, PA; he was also killed.

The news of the accident was stunning to the church and community and the gospel music world.

Reverend Timothy Wright, as the only survivor, was paralyzed by a C4 spinal cord injury in the accident and had undergone several months of rehabilitation at the Kessler Institute in West Orange, New Jersey before his ultimate death at age 61 at Bronx Veterans Hospital in Bronx, New York on April 24, 2009.