Otto Wanke (*1989) is a composer and music researcher based in Vienna. His education began with jazz composition in Prague and continued in Vienna, where he studied instrumental, multimedia, and electroacoustic composition with Wolfgang Liebhart, Iris ter Schiphorst, and Karlheinz Essl. He completed his studies with a PhD focused on spectral music under the supervision of Gesine Schröder and Martin Supper at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna (mdw). From 2018 to 2023, he was employed as an assistant at the Department of Ethnomusicology at the mdw. Since 2020, he has been teaching electroacoustic composition and multimedia at the Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts in Brno.
After receiving recognition at several international competitions—including the Frederic Mompou Award in Spain, FIMS in Switzerland, the Nikolaus Fheodoroff Composition Prize, and the Theodor Körner Prize in Austria—his music has been featured at major international festivals, including Wien Modern, Acht Brücken, Visiones Sonoras and Carinthian Summer. His works have been performed by renowned ensembles, orchestras, and soloists—such as PHACE, OENM, Black Pencil Ensemble, Grafenegg Symphony Orchestra, Austrian Jazz Composers Orchestra, Lars Mlekusch, Alexei Kornienko, Susanne Blumenthal, Wolfgang Mitterer, Christoph Cech, Yuri Revich, and Paul Gulda—and he has received commissions from institutions such as the National Opera in Warsaw, Brucknerhaus Linz, ZKM Karlsruhe, and ORF.
Alongside his compositional work, Wanke is active as a performer of electroacoustic music, appearing both as a soloist and in collaboration with other musicians. He also engages in improvisational projects, such as the modular synthesizer duo Los Modulinos with Karlheinz Essl. In addition, he is active in the field of music management: he founded the concert series and composition competition SoundChain, and since 2025, he has been working with the Brno Philharmonic as an external dramaturge.

Compositional Aesthetics
Otto Wanke’s work merges classical vocal-instrumental composition with electronics, multimedia, and sound art. He regards electroacoustic music as a natural extension of classical composition, enabling a more nuanced engagement with parameters like rhythm and timbre. Electronics do not necessarily appear solely as a sonic result; rather, they often play a role in the preparatory and compositional process itself, through the use of spectral analysis and various algorithmic techniques.
In his works, natural phenomena often serve as starting points for an abstract yet expressive musical language: one that explores shifting relationships between a sound’s inner structure and its projection onto compositional form, and examines interactions among sound materiality, spatial projection, and perceptual experience, shaped by the tools and poetics of technology.
It is through this interplay between acoustic instruments or vocals and electronics, complemented by visual media, that his music unfolds. He focuses on expanding the capabilities of acoustic instruments, inventing idiosyncratic and unorthodox ways of producing sound, and incorporating interdisciplinary concerns into a personal compositional aesthetic. The electronics in his work enhance—rather than replace—the expressive potential of instrumental and vocal music, offering new perspectives on the sonic experience.

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