Ellis, Alexander John

1814-1890

English writer on Phonetics and Acoustics. He was educated at Shrewsbury, Eton, and Trinity College, and was graduated from Cambridge, as B. A., in 1837. He became a fellow of the Royal Society in 1864, and was president of the Philological Society, 1872 to 1874 and 1880 to 1882; and was also a member of several other learned societies. He made a special study of the physical basis of musical sound, and also published some works on pronunciation in singing. He contributed to the Royal Society a number of papers on musical theory in relation to tones and their production, and was awarded a silver medal for each of several papers of inquiry in regard to the history of Musical Pitch, into which subject he made both theoretical and experimental research. He also translated into English, with notes and appendix, Helnholtz's work under the name of On the Sensations of Tone, as a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music.