André Ekyan (born André Echkyan) was a French alto saxophonist, clarinettist and bandleader, one of the first French musicians to play jazz and the reed player on many of the records Django Reinhardt made between 1934 and 1950. He was born in Meudon, just outside Paris, on October 24, 1907, into a family of Armenian origin, and taught himself to play. By the second half of the 1920s he was working at Le Perroquet in Paris, where he played in the Versatile Orchestra of the Belgian saxophonist Paul Gason and led an ensemble of his own.

In London he joined the orchestra of Jack Hylton: Discogs credits him on alto and tenor saxophone on Hylton sides that include recordings made there in June 1931. Back in Paris he led the band at the club La Croix du Sud in 1931 and 1932, with Stéphane Grappelli, Reinhardt and Alix Combelle among his players, and in 1933 he appeared at the Olympia with Grégor et ses Grégoriens. On January 15, 1934 he directed the orchestra behind the singer Jean Sablon on a Columbia session, and on April 11, 1934 the Discography of American Historical Recordings lists him on clarinet, with Reinhardt on guitar and Alec Siniavine on piano, behind Sablon on "Je sais que vous êtes jolie" and "Par correspondance."

From 1934 to 1936 he was one of the reed players in the studio orchestra of the violinist Michel Warlop. Discogs credits him on clarinet and alto saxophone on a run of Warlop sides that includes "Presentation Stomp," "Blue Interlude," "Miss Otis Regrette" and "Little Girl Blue," and German Wikipedia and Hans Koert's discography also place him in Warlop's orchestra behind Coleman Hawkins on March 2, 1935. Under his own name he recorded "Saint-Louis Blues" and "You Rascall You" for Ultraphone in 1935, with Combelle on clarinet and tenor saxophone and the trumpeter Pierre Allier; he arranged the first of the two. That year he started a band for tea dances on the Champs-Élysées, and in 1936 he opened the dancing-bar restaurant Swing Time, where he led the orchestra and where the Hot Club de France organised tea parties for dancers and jazz fans.

The Swing label, founded by the Hot Club's Charles Delaunay, gave him his best-known records. On April 28, 1937 he played alto saxophone beside Benny Carter on the first record the label issued, "Honeysuckle Rose" and "Crazy Rhythm," billed to Hawkins and His All Star Jam Band. On July 7, 1937 he and Reinhardt made a two-man single of "Pennies From Heaven" and "Tiger Rag" at Studio Albert in Paris. A session recorded on May 24, 1939 produced "Dream Ship" and "I Can't Believe That You're in Love With Me" with Reinhardt and the bassist Lucien Simoens; on March 22, 1940 he recorded "Sugar," "Margie," "Rosetta" and "A Pretty Girl Is Like a Melody" with Reinhardt and the bassist Emmanuel Soudieux; and a 1941 single of "Hungaria" and "Out of Nowhere" added the drummer Pierre Fouad and the guitarist Eugène Vées. During the war he also recorded for Odeon with his Swingtette, wrote both sides of one of its singles ("Standard Swing" and "Etude Rythmique"), and appeared in 1941 on a Paris music-hall bill that put the bands of Reinhardt, Gus Viseur and Ekyan on a three-tiered stage.

After the Liberation he went on leading dance and jazz orchestras for Odeon, including "Take the A Train" and "Blue Smoke," and a record of "Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop" with a vocal by André Salvador. According to Syncopated Times, in 1949 he persuaded Reinhardt to start performing again, and the two worked together in a quintet that toured the south of France, Switzerland and Italy. The Rome sessions of 1949 and 1950, issued by RCA as two volumes billed to Reinhardt, Grappelli and Ekyan, were the last he made with the guitarist. In the 1950s he led his orchestra at Maxim's in Paris, made the Pathé 10-inch LP Son saxo et ses cordes (1955), several Vega EPs and a Vega 10-inch album (1957), and recorded the Columbia LP Rendez-vous chez Maxim's (1958). In 1958 he was one of the players on Vega's tribute album Notre ami Django, with Henri Crolla, Grappelli and Hubert Rostaing, and in 1959 he fronted a large dance orchestra on Barclay EPs. He appeared as the character Rico in Jean-Pierre Melville's film Le Cercle rouge (1970), and passed away in Alicante, Spain, in August 1972.

Ekyan was self-taught, and AllMusic describes him as a secure, competent player who helped carry the swing-era style across France and other parts of Europe. The critic Michael Tucker, quoted by the writer Georg Lankester, hears him and Combelle as saxophonists shaped by American models such as Johnny Hodges, Benny Carter and Coleman Hawkins. Lankester adds that on alto he drew on the Chicago-style playing of Frankie Trumbauer and Carter, and that on clarinet he had a soft, easily recognised tone and improvised with few notes, which made him a good accompanist for Reinhardt. Much of his reputation rests on that partnership: the Swing singles of 1937 to 1945 billed to him, in which a clarinet or alto saxophone sits beside Reinhardt's guitar. He was also an organiser, running clubs and tea dances where French players met visiting Americans. Later records, such as the Maxim's dance sets, are light entertainment music and are not where his jazz standing comes from.