[3] He was one of eight children of Sophia Elizabeth née Ransome (1843–1909) and George Granville Bantock (1836–1913), a Scottish surgeon and gynaecologist who was at one time President of the Royal Gynaecological Society.

[3][5] Bantock's father was a remote and stern figure in his childhood and a man of strict principle in his work who challenged Joseph Lister in a famous scientific debate over surgical disinfectant and eventually proved his case at some cost to his reputation.

However, Bantock's mother, "Bessie", created an affectionate atmosphere in their home, allowing her children to play cricket in the corridors and keeping a menagerie of animals in the house including snakes and a monkey.

He wrote the book to Talbot's music for The White Chrysanthemum (1905) and The Belle of Brittany (1908) which, like The Girl Behind the Counter, proved to be successful in Britain and abroad.

In his later years Bantock was the General Manager of the Lyceum Theatre in London and for which he wrote the annual pantomime,[21] including that for The Sleeping Beauty (1920), Robinson Crusoe (1922),[22] Jack and the Beanstalk (1923),[23] The Forty Thieves (1924),[24] Dick Whittington (1925)[25] and Queen of Hearts (1927).