Zdenek Šesták is one of the most distinctive personalities in contemporary Czech music. His life and artistic career was undoubtedly prefigured in his birthplace - Citoliby near Louny, a village with an exceptionally rich cultural tradition, where Šesták spent his childhood and adolescence on the former Pachta estate. Both Šestak's parents were amateur musicians, mother was singing at the local church choir. No doubt this environment helped to stimulate his young musical imagination. On completion of technical secondary school in Louny he entered the Prague Conservatory, where he studied composition with Emil Hlobil and Miroslav Krejci (1945-1950). In parallel, he also studied musicology with Josef Hutter at Prague University. In the 1950s he embarked on a career both as a composer, and as a scholar specializing in 18th-century Czech music. He has written about the Kopřiva family of musicians and overseen the publications and recordings of works by composers from his native village Citoliby. He prepared several music editions including the double-CD and five-CD set "Hudba citolibských mistrů 18. století" [Music of the Citoliby Masters of the 18th Century, publ. by Supraphon], musicological studies, and also collaborated with Czech television on a film about the Citoliby masters.
Šesták's distinctive compositional signature developed independently of his academic work, but on several occasions he has turned to the results of his ardent historical research to find inspiration for the structure and expression of his compositions. His impressive parallel activities both as a composer and a musicologist are accompanied by artistic honesty and scholarly zeal. Much of this is reflected in Sestak's orchestral, concertante, cantata, choir and chamber works which are deeply rooted in the best tradition of Czech music.

While his first compositions were inspired by 20th century masterpieces, in the 1970s he sought a non-compromising style of expressive chords and clearly defined themes. In his artistic approach he rejected the randomness of improvisation, preferring concise forms and proportional balance, and he gradually became convinced of the ample opportunity for his creativity within strict formal boundaries. His works covers the whole range of genres from small instructive compositions and songs for children to large-scale cantatas, oratorio and symphonic music. He often seeks inspiration for his works in history, literature, poetry and philosophical thoughts on ethics, as well as on the permanence and mutability of all human values. In 2008 he has been awarded the Czech Ministry of Culture Prize for his livetime activities in the field of music as composer, organizer, and musicologist.