Don Ellis
1934 – 1978
Trumpeter, composer and bandleader. He took jazz into 5, 7, 9, 19 and 33, played a quarter-tone trumpet, and led one of the most startling big bands of the 1960s and ’70s.
Don Ellis in brief
Don Ellis (July 25, 1934 – December 17, 1978) was an American jazz trumpeter, composer and bandleader, best known for big-band jazz in unusual time signatures and for playing a quarter-tone trumpet. His orchestra burst onto the national scene at the Monterey Jazz Festival on August 16, 1966. Electric Bath (1967) was nominated for a Grammy and named Album of the Year by Down Beat, and in 1973 he won the Grammy for Best Instrumental Arrangement for “Theme from The French Connection.” Sources
Start here
The recordings
19 albums with personnel, tracks and release history.
Watch Don Ellis
Concert film and the Don Ellis YouTube playlist, including my 2008 New Horizons clip.
Hear the rhythms
Tap along to 9/8 as 3+2+2+2, 19/4, and a straight-ahead five.
The dissertation
The Exotic Rhythms of Don Ellis: free PDF, with the full contents.
Memorial Library
Over 300 pieces of music, now at UCLA. Where it is and how to ask.
Hank Levy and Don Ellis
The teacher who introduced me to Ellis, and the 1995 interview.
Don Ellis’s Rhythm: the complete book, free to download
His book on Hindu rhythmic techniques, hard to find in print, photographed page by page from my own copy and reconstructed as a free download.
Read and downloadAbout this site
I am Sean Fenlon. I first heard Don Ellis through my composition teacher, Hank Levy, at Towson State in the late 1980s, and later wrote my doctoral dissertation on Ellis’s rhythms. I put this site online in 2001 to keep his music easy to find. It is a fan site, not the official voice of the Ellis family or estate.
Recent notes
- October 11, 2026
Hank Levy on Don Ellis: A Lost Interview, Recovered by AI
Yesterday, for the first time, I was able to read an interview I recorded about 30 years ago with my composition teacher, Hank…
- September 7, 2026
Rhythm by Don Ellis — A New System of Rhythm Based on the Ancient Hindu Techniques
Don Ellis’s book Rhythm is available here as a complete digital copy, photographed page by page from my own copy. Long known…
- October 10, 2014
In Search of Don Ellis, Forgotten Genius (Volumes 1, 2, and 3) by Ken Orton
I recently received an email from David Aldridge from LA who attended Towson University 1977-1979, and played in Hank Levy's big…