The return of Pradeep and a journey of fusion music
A few weeks ago, on the evening of the 21st of May, I had the pleasure of listening to Pradeep Ratnayake’s music once again. On this occasion at the Lionel Wendt Theatre, he performed with the following accompanying artistes: Harsha Makalanda (piano), the multi-talented Ravibandu (drums), Alston Joachim (bass guitar), Shiraz Nooramith (acoustic drums), Peshala Manoj (tabla) and Isuru Perera (tabla and percussion).
The two daughters of Pradeep and Madhubhashini, Mithahasini (cello and voice) and Sajani (piano and voice) joined their father to pay tribute to the late Sarath Fernando and performed Nil Ahas Thaley to a new music arrangement by Pradeep and Mithahasini. The two siblings also contributed to Stallions, the last offering for the evening, in which the rest of the above-named artistes too, participated. It must be noted, for the record, that although Madhubhashini does not contribute musically on stage at Pradeep’s concerts, her contribution off-stage is substantial given that she’s involved in the nitty gritty of their organisation.
At Pradeepanjalee XV111: Left to right, Peshala Manoj, Pradeep Ratnayake, Isuru Perera and Ravibandu
As is always the case with Pradeep Ratnayake’s concerts, the audience was treated to an evening of breathtaking music. What stood out for me were Pradeep’s improvisations which have been a regular feature of his more recent concerts. We are indebted to Sarala Fernando, Santhushya Fernando and Sunethra Bandaranaike for making Pradeepanjalee XV111 possible for our collective enjoyment by their generous sponsorship of the concert.
The brochure distributed at the concert provides useful background information on the innovations and improvisations we notice in Pradeep’s music, and I was tempted to draw freely from it in writing this piece. I have tried not to resist this temptation. Pradeep is a classically-trained musician with his forte being Hindustani Ragadhari music. He has, however, not confined himself to rendering classical music alone. He has moved out of the familiar ‘to embrace other genres and traditions from around the world to create compositions and sounds that are seldom heard’. In the process, Pradeep has expanded the identity of the sitar by indigenising the instrument. He does so by fusing it with the sounds of local percussion, getebera and also by using, on occasion, Sri Lanka’s folk melodies as the main melody line to make improvisations as is done in the ragadhari tradition. We also gather that in addition to the above, Pradeep also ‘imports new techniques to his instrument like, for instance, the concept of harmony found in western classical music and is absent in the eastern tradition. Hindustani, classical, Sri Lankan folk, western classical, jazz, blues, rock, pop- – all fuse into completely organic compositions by him that introduce a new sound to the world of music’.
Pradeep is the son of the late Bandula and Seetha Ratnayake. His father encouraged him to pursue in earnest his passion for music. Pradeep began his education at Prince of Wales College, Moratuwa and thereafter attended S. Thomas’ Prep School, D.S. Senanayake Vidyalaya and finally Mahanama College. His first public performance on the sitar was at a concert held in the auditorium of the National Museum when Pradeep was all of ten years old. It is interesting to note that the budding musician qualified to enter the University of Colombo in the late 1980s intending to read for the Special Degree in Mathematics. But destiny had other plans for him.
The late 1980s was a time of enormous political turmoil in Sri Lanka. The state was besieged by violent challenges to it from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in the north and the Janatha Vimukthi Perumuna (JVP) in the south. As a result, the universities of Sri Lanka, like other national institutions, were in deep crisis. The brutal assassinations of the Vice Chancellors of the Colombo and Moratuwa Universities and of an Assistant Registrar at the University of Peradeniya, believed to be a part of the violence unleashed by the JVP, led to the indefinite closure of all the universities in the country.
It is in this bleak context that Pradeep Ratnayake decided to abandon his plans for undergraduate study at the University of Colombo. In 1992, he accepted a scholarship awarded by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations to follow an undergraduate course of study in music at the Visva Bharati Santiniketan. There he secured not only a Bachelor’s but a Master’s degree as well, in music.
It was the Goethe Institute that helped Pradeep to launch the first ever Pradeepanjalee in 1997 by hosting the concert at 35, Gregory’s Road. This was followed by his performance at the ILO auditorium in Geneva, Switzerland. In the year 2000, Pradeep helped the Central Bank of Sri Lanka to celebrate its 50th anniversary. The Governor of the Central Bank at the time, Dr. A.S. Jayawardena made the following comments on the occasion:
It was the fiftieth anniversary of the Central Bank in 2000, and we dared the young musician, Pradeep Ratnayake, to compose a fitting memorial to the Bank in music, as Giuseppe Verdi did to immortalise the opening of the Suez Canal by his opera, Aida’.
Pradeep took up the challenge and, having delved into our cultural roots and the heroic poems of other cultures, he composed the symphonic tone poem Indrakeelaya on the theme of a phoenix rising from the ashes. This composition was to honour those at the Central Bank who had lost their lives as well those who survived the devastating attack on the premises by the LTTE in January 1996. Indrakeelaya (the unshakable) is widely accepted to be a classic.
A couple of years later, Pradeep Ratnayake and Friends helped the bi-national United States – Sri Lanka Fulbright Commission (US – SLFC) to celebrate its 50th anniversary by bringing together a fascinating array of compositions. These included a fusion of re-worked Sri Lankan folk melodies, classical Indian ragas and the music of John Coltrane and George Gershwin in arrangements that were played on both eastern and western musical instruments. Several years later, on the March 27, 2014, the US- SLFC sponsored Pradeepanjalee X1 at the Bishop’s College auditorium.
In between these two performances, in 2008, Pradeep won a Fulbright scholarship and received the benefit of studying Computer Music for two years at Columbia University, New York, under the guidance of Prof. Brad Garten. He brought home his new knowledge acquired during his Fulbright postgraduate studies and used that knowledge to create a new Department of Music and Creative Technology in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Sri Jayewardenepura. He was the Founder-Head of this new department and subsequently introduced new courses and revised the syllabi of existing ones on the subject.
Through his labours, Pradeep has succeeded in carefully blending the traditional with the modern, thereby enabling the contemporary students of music to familiarise themselves with new technologies to meet the demands of the current world of entertainment. It was, therefore, both fitting and proper that Pradeep Ratnayake should have been appointed Professor of Music at his university in March 2018.
It is noteworthy that despite achieving recognition and fame, both nationally and internationally, Pradeep Ratnayake’s simplicity and humility remain intact. Given his tremendous talent, his modesty and quiet confidence, we can look forward to more feasts for our ears from him in the years to come.
Let me conclude this brief piece with two observations on Pradeep Ratnayake’s music by the late Lester James Pieris and Nihal Rodrigo. Here is Pieris’ take:
Pradeep Ratnayake is that rare phenomenon in any country – - the supreme virtuoso performer in his chosen instrument – - the sitar. He is a young composer opening up new worlds of sound by the fusion of Eastern and Western music.
Rodrigo notes that:
He [Pradeep Ratnayake] crosses cultural boundaries – - confident effortless travel across styles, idioms, forms and traditions…. The music centre did indeed hold. Things did not fall apart.
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