Tonny Eyk, a pen-name of Teun Eikelboom (The Hague, July 4, 1940), is one of the country’s most striking media composers. This is because, in addition to his work behind the scenes, he has also regularly appeared as an orchestra leader or as a musical accompanist in television programs. In fact, Tonny Eyk has been musically involved with the medium literally from the beginning of the development of television in the Netherlands, as he was able to see and hear the first experimental broadcasts at the age of 10. He was also musically involved in the first Dutch advertising broadcast in 1963 for Mecom Television. He can therefore certainly be called a pioneer in the field of music and media.
Tonny Eyk’s oeuvre is broad and covers not only iconic signature melodies such as those of ‘AVRO’s Toppop’, ‘Wedden dat..?’ and ‘Studio Sport’ or music for TV icons Van Kooten and De Bie, but also, for example, the musical design of television channel Nederland 3 when it started in 1988. Eyk was also (co-) responsible for numerous songs for Kinderen Voor Kinderen (including ‘Ik Heb Zo Waanzinnig Gedroomd’ and ‘Op Een Onbewoond Eiland’), for music for series such as ‘De Zevensprong’, ‘De Stille Kracht’ and ‘Hollands Glorie’, signature tunes from NOS, Socutera and Teleac, and scores for films such as ‘De Boezemvriend’, ‘Nummer 14’ and ‘Gewoon Hans’.