100% yes! Python is amazing.
Another option is Lua for use with the Torch (Facebook's machine learning library).
Both are great languages, but I think Lua has the upper hand on speed due to LuaJIT (Just In Time compilation), which is based on Lua 5.1 (3 main versions of Lua in the wild are 5.1, 5.2, and 5.3, but LuaJIT is stuck in 5.1).