I’m a bit early for my interview but that gives me the pleasure of listening to two of Sri Lanka’s best young classical musicians rehearse. Emotive, clear, flawless music emanates from the room, in which Mandhira de Saram (violinist) and Eshantha Peiris (pianist) are practising and blissfully pervades the household. While this is a treat for me, for the de Sarams it’s nothing out of the ordinary.
“When I was growing up we always had classical music playing,” recalls Mandhira. “Like when I woke up in the morning I could hear my dad practising and for me it was normal. I used to think that everyone else used to wake up to it too!”
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Mandhira: ‘As a child I used to wake up to the sounds of classical music’
Pic by Mangala Weerasekera |
Coming from a family of classical musicians, her father and uncle Druvi and Rohan de Saram being recognised as some of the best the country has produced, with music being a predominant part of her life, Mandhira is immensely talented, her talent corroborated by her impressive resume. Some of those notable achievements include her graduating from the University of Oxford with first class honours and winning the Worcester College Arts Prize for the highest result in an arts subject.
While classical music has been a large part of her life, Mandhira has developed a diverse taste in music. “I guess my parents would play whatever they liked and they were really into classical music. And it was actually much later on that I started listening to pop and rock. Probably slightly later than most kids,” she laughs.
It is the diversity of her musical preferences that has prompted her to experiment and take on more challenging music. However, she explains that even classical music involves a fair share of experimenting. While the notes are written down, and they have some direction, it is mostly up to the musician to experiment and work out the best way to communicate it. “I do like classical repertoire and contemporary music; I do a bit of each,” Mandhira explains.
Even with contemporary commercial music she is more inclined to rock. “I like rock quite a lot. I do some kind of string arrangements for rock musicians and I’ve worked with soul musicians,” she says adding “I worked with Shirley Bassey that was fun!” Pop songstress, Shirley Bassey who had a string of hits in the 70s, recorded the theme songs for three of the most popular James Bond movies.
Mandhira reveals that when choosing her profession she had actually considered mathematics and classics such as Greek and Latin. Waving off those options she says “I guess subconsciously I knew I’d end up performing or doing music. A lot of people say math and music are connected and there have been a lot of mathematicians who were musicians as well,” cheerfully adding “like Einstein.”
As Mandhira talks animatedly about classical music it isn’t hard to see that she loves what she does. However, she does recall a time when she was much younger and rebelled against the strict discipline it required “At one point I used to really hate it but I liked it again,” she elaborates smiling. “Actually I used to hate practising. I used to wake up at 6.30 in the morning and go for practices.” Her practices were early as she would head off to school right after.
As she grew older her appreciation of classical music grew and now as a freelance violinist in the UK, she’s quite thrilled with the work she does. “I think I’m lucky because my hobby is also my work. I guess it’s nice to have a cross over.” But even for someone who is as incredibly talented as she is, it’s no cakewalk. “I’ve been thinking recently how tough it’s been building a career over the past three years,” she says. “I’m quite lucky because I’m living my dream. Having not joined an orchestra I have no particular commitment, I have a lot of freedom in what I do. I do pop one day, and the next day I work with a jazz artist and the following day I can work with a classical artist. I can do whatever I like.”
Having lived in Sri Lanka until she was 12, before moving to the UK, Mandhira says she prefers living in Sri Lanka. “I used to come back once a year, but I haven’t been back in three years. It’s a bit difficult with work. I love Sri Lanka but I think because of my career it’s better to live in England because there are more opportunities for classical musicians there. I’ve loved coming back though and I played with the Symphony Orchestra a couple of days ago. That was great fun; it was like coming back home and being with my big extended family because I knew them so well when I lived here.”
For a country so small, classical music is doing very well here, she reflects. “There’s a music school opened fairly recently by Eshantha Peiris and it’s doing some really good work. And they do a lot of experimental music so it’s not just classical music, there’s pop and rock as well which I think broadens the horizons a bit.”
Currently in India performing at back to back concerts, Mandhira returns after that whirlwind tour, for her duet performance with Eshantha Pieris on August 14 and then heads back to the UK. She would like to visit Sri Lanka more often, she says, and if she can, gather enough funds to introduce to Sri Lanka what’s currently popular in the UK, a cinematic classical music experience. |
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