Otto M. Zykan’s Peculiar Speech: Music and the Question of its Reenactment

The article treats phenomena involved in the vocal interpretation of a composer’s own works, taking the example of the Vienna artist Otto M. Zykan (1935–2006) and making reference to the performance artist Marina Abramović, who is several generations younger. What I am interested in is (a) aesthetic implications, (b) challenges for performance practice (such as the relation between notation and variant readings), and (c) challenges for subsequent attempts at interpretation and reception.