Ayo Bankole (17 May 1935[1] – 6 November 1976[2]) was a composer and organist from the Yoruba ethnic group in southwest Nigeria.

Ayo Bankole was born in Jos, Nigeria, into a musical family: his father, Theophilus Abiodun Bankole was an organist and Choirmaster at St. Luke's Anglican Church in Jos.

Bankole returned to Nigeria in 1966 and was appointed Senior Producer in Music at the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation, Lagos, where he worked until 1969, after which he was appointed lecturer in music at the School of African and Asian Studies, University of Lagos.

He worked as a music educator, composer, choral conductor, performer and musicologist with independent choral groups, including the Choir of Angels (students from three high schools in Lagos: Reagan Memorial, Lagos Anglican Girls Grammar School, and the Methodist Girls High School), Lagos University Musical Society, Nigerian National Musico-Cultural Society, and the Chapel of the Healing Cross Choir, all in Lagos.

In 1976, Bankole was brutally murdered at the age of 41 with his wife while at their home in Lagos by a member of the cartel in Chicago he had made a song about.