Herbert J. Ellis

Herbert J. Ellis as a young man, holding a Portuguese guitar.

Herbert J. Ellis (4 July 1865 – 13 October 1903) was a banjo player, a mandolinist, guitar player and a composer. Music historian Philip J. Bone called him "without question the most fertile English composer and arranger for mandolin and guitar." He was the author of a banjo method, a guitar method, and a Tutor for Mandolin (1892), which he wrote while still in school.

Ellis was born in Dulwich, London, the son of a licensed victualler, and received no musical instruction beyond that given by his mother, who had been a pupil of Sir Julius Benedict; she taught her son the piano and harmony. He became the delighted owner of a banjo as a boy and said that, "Having the infatuation (for the banjo), I learnt several tunes out of my piano tutor, and then occurred to me the idea of writing my own music for it. Gradually growing ambitious, I did not rest until I had written an instruction book, which, in due course saw the light and without being egotistical, I think I can safely say that it was from the advent of my Thorough school that the banjo began to be popular." Thorough School for the Mandoline John Alvey Turner, pub., London (1898) Dallas Tutor for the Banjo, John Dallas and Sons (1930) Tutor for the Five-String Banjo, John Dallas and Sons (1948) over one thousand works by Ellis, all published by John Alvey Turner, pub., London more works published by Dallas pub., London