Otto M. Zykan was born in Vienna on April 29, 1935. He received his first piano lessons from his grandmother on his father's side and later took lessons from Friedrich Ebenstein, Bruno Seidlhofer, Richard Hauser and Josef Dichler. After a year with the Vienna Boys' Choir, he entered the Academy of Music in Vienna at the age of eleven. From 1953, he studied piano as a concert subject and went on to study composition with Karl Schiske. The piano became his starting point for composition and performance, as well as for exploring the music of the 20th century.
In 1955, Zykan worked as a theater musician and choir director at the Scala Theater in Vienna. His curiosity for new music and the awakening of the music scene led to the dramaturgy of the Vienna Salon Concerts in 1965. In 1968, Zykan founded the MOB art & tone ART Ensemble with Kurt Schwertsik and HK Gruber, which premiered influential works by Zykan, Schwertsik, HK Gruber and Alfred Peschek.
Subsequently, music theater became Zykan's domain. Works such as Singers Nähmaschine ist die beste (1966), Staatsoperette (1977), Kunst kommt von Gönnen (1980) and Symphonie aus der heilen Welt (1977) merge film, performance, song and gesture into a new art form. His early compositional work with electronics led to the Linzer Klangwolke Odyssee (1994). Zykan also worked as a composer in the film industry. His avant-garde-inspired advertising films for the Austrian shoe manufacturer Humanic became popular in the 1970s.
Zykan's instrumental oeuvre was often inspired by his collaboration with specific musicians and orchestras: Ernst Kovacic, Heinrich Schiff, Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Mihaela Ursuleasa are just as worthy of mention as the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Tonkünstler Orchester Niederösterreich.
Zykan was awarded the Kranichstein Music Prize (Darmstadt) in 1958, the Promotion Prize of the City of Vienna in 1964, the Appreciation Prize (Federal Ministry for Education and the Arts) in 1985, the Prize of the City of Vienna in 1990 and the Lower Austrian Culture Prize in 1995. The composer, pianist, performer, poet, filmmaker, actor and ensemble founder died on May 25, 2006 in Sachsendorf (Lower Austria).
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