Born March 10, 1926 in Novosibirsk in the family of a surgeon and teacher of Russian language and literature. Since childhood, he played the piano, studied in music and general education schools. After graduation, he entered the Novosibirsk Institute of Railway Engineers, but was soon expelled and drafted into the army. He was sent to the Tyumen officer school, then served in the Novosibirsk ensemble of song and dance. After serving in the army, he worked in the Novosibirsk Philharmonic, then entered the Alma-Ata Conservatory for the piano department. The following year he was transferred to the composition department, where he studied with the famous composer and teacher, Professor Evgeny Brusilovskiy. Graduate work Zatsepin - ballet in three acts "Old Man Hottabych" for a long time was included in the repertoire of the Almaty Opera and Ballet Theatre.
After graduating from the conservatory in 1956, Zatsepin worked as a concertmaster in the Almaty Philharmonic and at the same time began to write music for films, debuting as a film composer in the film "Our Sweet Doctor" (1957, dir. Shaken Aimanov). At the end of the fifties, at the invitation of composer, conductor and arranger Viktor Knushevitsky, he moved to Moscow, where a few years later he began to collaborate with director Leonid Gaidai. Their first joint work was the short films “Samogoniki” and “The Dog Barbos and the Unusual Cross” (1961), which marked the beginning of their long-term and more than successful creative union – for many years the music of Alexander Zatsepin became an integral part of Gaidai’s paintings “Operation Y and Other Adventures of Shurika” (1965), “The Diamond Arm” (1968), “12 Chairs” (1971), “Ivan Vasilyevich Changes Profession” (1973), “Nazhenija” (1982), “Nazhenija” in the film “Kazhenija” (1975), “Kazhenija” (Alextov) and “Alextov’s” (1982), “Kazhimuyevna” (Alextovna, retov), “Alextov’s” (1978), “Kazheniyevna” (1982), “Alextov’s” (1978), “Kazheniyuyevna” (1978), “Kazhimuyevnikov, Many songs of the composer, sounded in the cinema, including “Song about bears”, “Song about hares”, “Island of bad luck”, “There is only a moment” and “Everything was” became so popular that they found their own, separate from the films life. Co-author of many of Zatsepin’s songs was the famous songwriter Leonid Derbenev, with whom he worked for many years. In the mid-seventies, Zatsepin began to work with Alla Pugacheva, writing a number of songs for her: "Goodbye, summer", "Love alone is to blame", "The shaman's tambourine", "Where does childhood go?", "The Uneducated Wizard", "Who, I don't know, spreads rumors in vain ...". The crown of their cooperation was the musical film "The Woman Who Sings" (1978, dir. Alexander Orlov), which, despite the extremely negative attitude of critics, gained enormous popularity and became the leader of the Soviet box office in 1979.
In the early eighties, married a Frenchwoman, the composer left the country and, without changing his citizenship, lived and worked in France for several years. Since then, he has lived in two houses in Moscow and Paris. In addition to music for movies and numerous songs, he owns romances on poems of domestic poets, musicals "Golden Keys", "Two Women and Envy", "Russian Christmas in Paris", music for performances and instrumental works - Indian Suite, Suite on themes of the peoples of Asia and Africa for a symphony orchestra, string quartet, preludes for piano. The holder of the honorary title of Honored Artist of the Russian Federation, Corresponding Member of the National Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, member of the Union of Composers and the Union of Cinematographers, Alexander Sergeyevich Zatsepin continues to work fruitfully, composing new music. In recent years, the composer worked with the poet Yuri Rogozin. Creativity Zatsepin and to this day remains very popular - his works are included in the repertoire of many popular artists, periodically appear albums with music from movies, as well as collections of both old and new songs of the composer.