Olivier Gagnon is a Canadian composer who studied the saxophone at the Conservatoire de musique de Québec before he started his education in composition at the Faculté de musique de l'Université de Montréal with François-Hugues Leclair and Alan Belkin. In this institution, he also accomplished a Doctorate in Musical Art in composition supervised by Alan Belkin and Caroline Traube. Additionally, he made an internship in composition for wind symphony with the composer Jan van der Roost at the Lemmensinstituut in Belgium. During this internship funded by the Canada Concil for the Arts, he also worked with the composer Luc van Hove.

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             In 2005, his piece “Diabolus in Musica” won a composition competition organized by the saxophone quartet Quasar. The work was premiered by the quartet at the Jusqu'aux oreilles festival. In 2009, Olivier won a composition competition organized by the Faculté de musique de l'Université de Montréal and the National Theater School of Canada. They commissioned him a chamber opera. The work's name is “L'homme à deux têtes” and was premiered in Montreal in 2011. In 2010, the Canada Concil for the Arts awarded him a travel grant to participate at the first International Antonín Dvořák Composition Competition. There he won the first prize in the senior for his piece “Un instant dans l'esprit de Lovecraft” that was premiered in 2012 at the Rudolphinum concert hall in Prague. In 2014, he won the wind symphony section of the Concorso internazionale di composizione "Romualdo Marenco" for his piece “Balade ornithologique”. The work was premiered 2015 in Italy. The jury of the competition shared that his music showed “a homogenous language with considerable wealth and variety of colours in the orchestration, as well as an excellent structure testifying the maturity of the musician”.   Additionally, his piece “Tempête” was awarded the second prize at the International Composition Competition Haelbeke. The piece was premiered in 2016 in Belgium. In 2017, he won the third prize at the Prix Collégien de musique contemporaine for his piece “Ciel polaire”, that was premiered in Montreal in 2016.