Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jun 26, 2026

Herbert Lambert

Herbert Richard Lambert, FRPS, was a British portrait photographer known for his portrayals of professional musicians and composers including Gustav Holst.

Last revised
Jun 26, 2026
Read time
≈ 2 min
Length
419 w
Citations
11
Source
Herbert Lambert
Born
Herbert Richard Lambert

1882
United Kingdom
Died7 March 1936 (aged 53–54)
United Kingdom
OccupationPhotographer

Herbert Richard Lambert, FRPS, (1882 – 7 March 1936)1 was a British portrait photographer known for his portrayals of professional musicians and composers including Gustav Holst.

In 1923 he published Modern British Composers: Seventeen Portraits in collaboration with Sir Eugene Goossens,2 and in 1926, he became managing director of the Elliott & Fry portrait studio.3 In 1930, he published Studio portrait lighting, a technical guidebook.4 He is also responsible for salvaging much of the 19th-century photography of Henry Fox Talbot, by re-photographing the remains of Talbot's photographs.5

In addition to photography, Lambert was also an amateur maker of musical instruments, specialising in harpsichords and clavichords. In 1927, he lent a clavichord which he had built to Herbert Howells; Howells used it to compose a 12-piece collection, which he named "Lambert's Clavichord".67

Howells also introduced Lambert to Gerald Finzi,8 whose 1936 Interlude for oboe & string quartet, Op. 21 was inspired by Lambert.9

A Quaker, Lambert was imprisoned as a conscientious objector during the First World War.5 He lived in Combe Down, Bath, Somerset.10

References

References

  1. HERBERT LAMBERT, from the British Journal of Photography, volume 83; 13 March 1936; p 164
  2. Modern British Composers. Seventeen Portraits by Herbert Lambert, with a Foreword on Contemporary British Music by Eugene Goossens, at WorldCat; retrieved 26 July 2011
  3. Herbert Lambert at the National Portrait Gallery; recovered 26 July 2011
  4. Studio portrait lighting at WorldCat; retrieved 26 July 2011
  5. The magic image: the genius of photography; by Cecil Beaton and Gail Buckland (1975, Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
  6. Herbert Howells Performed on Lautenwerck Archived 2 October 2012 at the Wayback Machine, by Edward Brinkley, from the South Central Music Bulletin (Volume IV, number 1 – Fall 2005); page 54; "named in honor of Herbert Lambert, who in 1927 let Howells borrow one of his hand-made clavichords"; retrieved 26 July 2005
  7. A Harpsichord Odyssey (I) Archived 28 September 2011 at the Wayback Machine by Edgar Hunt, at the British Harpsichord Society; posted online 27 November 2005; retrieved 26 July 2011
  8. Gerald Finzi: His Life and Music, by Diana McVeagh, page 63; 2010, Boydell & Brewer (via Google Books)
  9. Interlude for oboe & string quartet, Op. 21 at Allmusic, by Joseph Stevenson; retrieved 26 July 2011
  10. The art of accompaniment from a thorough-bass: as practised in the XVIIth & XVIIIth centuries, by F. T. Arnold; originally published by Oxford University Press, 1931; page xxvii; via Google Books
External links