[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":402},["ShallowReactive",2],{"person-en-sisira-senaratne":3},{"id":4,"title":5,"artistId":6,"birthYear":7,"body":8,"born":363,"description":364,"died":365,"era":366,"extension":367,"heroImage":368,"imageCredit":369,"imageLicense":370,"imageSource":371,"meta":372,"navigation":373,"notable":373,"path":374,"roles":375,"seo":380,"sources":381,"stem":400,"translated":373,"url":384,"__hash__":401},"peopleEn\u002Fen\u002Fpeople\u002Fsisira-senaratne.md","Sisira Senaratne",863,1935,{"type":9,"value":10,"toc":353},"minimark",[11,15,20,23,31,42,46,73,131,134,138,148,221,224,231,235,276,289,293,308,326,329,333],[12,13,14],"p",{},"Sri Lankan schoolchildren in the early 1950s went to the cinema and heard Sinhala films sung in Sinhala by Indian singers — Jikki, A. M. Raja, P. Susheela — who could not always pronounce the words. The films were made in Madras because Ceylon had no studio of its own, and the songs came with Hindi and Tamil melodies attached. Somewhere in that audience was a Chilaw boy who had already written his first tune at the age of twelve. Sisira Senaratne's contribution to Sinhala music can be stated in one sentence: he wrote his own.",[16,17,19],"h2",{"id":18},"a-boy-who-sang-the-scale-in-year-four","A boy who sang the scale in year four",[12,21,22],{},"He was born on 29 March 1935 in Chilaw. His mother, Leelawathi Mallikaarachchi, died when he was three months old and his father, Henry Solomon Senaratne, married again, so he was brought up by his grandfather, an Ayurvedic physician. He was schooled at St Mary's College, Chilaw, then Maradana Central College and Nalanda College, Colombo.",[12,24,25,26,30],{},"Sinhala accounts of his childhood all repeat the same detail: that in his fourth year at school he could sing the seven notes of the scale accurately in pitch, and that this was how his ear was discovered. He wanted to be a short-story writer and an actor. The voice got in the way. He entered the Government College of Music, sang on the radio, and at twelve wrote and composed his first song — for someone else's voice, that of ",[27,28,29],"strong",{},"Dharmadasa Walpola",".",[12,32,33,34,37,38,41],{},"At fourteen, through T. F. Latheef and the film-maker ",[27,35,36],{},"Sirisena Wimalaweera",", he was introduced to ",[27,39,40],{},"Lester James Peries",". That introduction decided the next sixty years.",[16,43,45],{"id":44},"podi-putha-and-then-rekava","Podi Putha, and then Rekava",[12,47,48,49,52,53,57,58,61,62,65,66,52,69,72],{},"His first film song was ",[27,50,51],{},"මේ ලෝකේ නවාතැනවේ"," ",[54,55,56],"em",{},"Me Loke Nawathanawe"," (\"this world is a lodging house\") for ",[54,59,60],{},"Podi Putha"," in 1955. The following year Peries took a crew out of the studio and into a village to shoot ",[54,63,64],{},"Rekava",", the film usually treated as the beginning of a Sinhala cinema that looked like Sri Lanka, and Senaratne sang ",[27,67,68],{},"ඕළු නෙළුම් නෙරිය රඟාලා",[54,70,71],{},"Olu Nelum Neriya Rangala"," — water lilies and lotuses dancing at the hem of a cloth. It is still the song his name is attached to.",[12,74,75,76,79,80,83,84,87,88,91,92,95,96,99,100,103,104,107,108,111,112,114,115,52,118,121,122,124,125,52,128,30],{},"He kept singing for films through the 1950s and 1960s — ",[54,77,78],{},"Sirakaruwa"," (1957), ",[54,81,82],{},"Ekamath Eka Rataka"," (1958), ",[54,85,86],{},"Ma Alaya Kala Tharuniya",", ",[54,89,90],{},"Gehanu Geta"," and ",[54,93,94],{},"Hadisi Vivahaya"," (1959), ",[54,97,98],{},"Wana Mala"," (1960), ",[54,101,102],{},"Jeewitha Poojawa"," (1961), ",[54,105,106],{},"Daskon"," (1962), on to ",[54,109,110],{},"Golu Hadawatha"," in 1969. From ",[54,113,78],{}," came the nursery-perfect ",[27,116,117],{},"ටිකිරි ටිකිරි ටිකිරි ලියා",[54,119,120],{},"Tikiri Tikiri Tikiri Liya","; from ",[54,123,90],{},", the cradle song ",[27,126,127],{},"රන්වලා තොටිල්ලේ",[54,129,130],{},"Ranwala Thotille",[12,132,133],{},"He never sang many songs — the Sunday Observer's reviewer noted that the total is small and that this has not stopped any of them staying fresh. He is also said by Sri Lankan reports to have sung duets with only one partner in his whole career.",[16,135,137],{"id":136},"original-tunes","Original tunes",[12,139,140,141,144,145,147],{},"That partner was ",[27,142,143],{},"Indrani Wijebandara",". They met at the moment of departure, on an Air Ceylon flight to Madras — both were flying out to record the music for ",[54,146,64],{}," — and married on 31 May 1962. From 1957 onwards, he composed the melody for essentially everything she sang.",[12,149,150,151,52,154,157,158,52,161,164,165,168,169,171,172,52,175,178,179,52,182,185,186,52,189,192,193,52,196,199,200,52,203,206,207,52,210,213,214,52,217,220],{},"Their joint achievement is the reason both of them are remembered. Sri Lankan writers describe the Sisira–Indrani partnership as ushering in a new era in Sinhala music in the 1950s, and the mechanism was simple: original Sinhala melodies, written for Sinhala words, sung by Sinhala voices, at a moment when the industry standard was a borrowed tune with new words laid over it. Out of that came ",[27,152,153],{},"ගයා ගීතයන් ගමේ වෙල් එළියේ",[54,155,156],{},"Gaya Geethayan Game Wel Eliye"," (\"singing songs in the village paddy fields\"), for which he wrote the words as well as the tune; ",[27,159,160],{},"නුහුරු නුපුරුදු රහස",[54,162,163],{},"Nuhuru Nupurudu Rahasa"," (\"a strange, unfamiliar secret\") to a lyric by ",[27,166,167],{},"Karunasena Jayalath",", whose novel ",[54,170,110],{}," was capturing the same young readership at the same moment; ",[27,173,174],{},"පිදුරු සෙවිලි කළ පැල්පතේ",[54,176,177],{},"Piduru Sewili Kala Pelpathe"," (\"in the straw-thatched hut\"); ",[27,180,181],{},"නීල ජලාසේ රඟනා",[54,183,184],{},"Neela Jalase Rangana"," (\"dancing on the blue lake\") to a Karunaratne Abeysekara lyric; ",[27,187,188],{},"ආලෝකේ පතුරා",[54,190,191],{},"Aloke Pathura"," (\"spreading light\"); ",[27,194,195],{},"ඈත අහසේ",[54,197,198],{},"Atha Ahase"," (\"in the far sky\"); ",[27,201,202],{},"හඳපානේ මල් පිපුණා",[54,204,205],{},"Handapane Mal Pipuna"," (\"flowers bloomed in the moonlight\"); ",[27,208,209],{},"සල් සපු මල්",[54,211,212],{},"Sal Sapu Mal","; and ",[27,215,216],{},"මංගල මල් දම",[54,218,219],{},"Mangala Mal Dama"," (\"the wedding garland\").",[12,222,223],{},"A large part of that repertoire ended up being sung by and to children, and the pair are routinely credited with building the modern Sinhala children's-song tradition — a body of work that had been thin before them and became a school staple afterwards.",[12,225,226,227,230],{},"He also wrote lyrics for other singers, among them ",[27,228,229],{},"H. R. Jothipala"," and Angeline Gunathilake.",[16,232,234],{"id":233},"handapana-and-the-awards","Handapana and the awards",[12,236,237,238,241,242,245,246,249,250,91,253,256,257,91,260,263,264,267,268,271,272,275],{},"In 1965 he moved to the other side of the glass. ",[54,239,240],{},"Handapana",", released that June, was his first film as music director, and it won him the Sarasaviya award for best music direction at the festival held in 1966. He directed the music for about ten more films — ",[54,243,244],{},"Hithata Hitha"," (1965), ",[54,247,248],{},"Punchi Baba"," (1968), ",[54,251,252],{},"Senehasa",[54,254,255],{},"Kauda Hari"," (1969), ",[54,258,259],{},"Mage Ran Putha",[54,261,262],{},"Deepanjali"," (1978), ",[54,265,266],{},"Ran Ethana"," (1981), ",[54,269,270],{},"Gajamuthu",", and as late as ",[54,273,274],{},"Punaruthpaththiya"," in 1997 — and then went back to singing, which he preferred.",[12,277,278,279,52,282,285,286,288],{},"At the first Guvan Viduli (radio) awards in 1970 he won best male singer for ",[27,280,281],{},"මාගෙ පුතුට මල්",[54,283,284],{},"Mage Puthuta Mal"," (\"flowers for my son\") from ",[54,287,248],{},", to words by Dharmasiri Gamage. In 1997 he received the Swarna Jayanthi award at the eleventh Presidential Film Festival.",[16,290,292],{"id":291},"sisindra-and-a-life-kept-alongside-a-day-job","Sisindra, and a life kept alongside a day job",[12,294,295,296,299,300,303,304,307],{},"None of this was his job. Senaratne worked for Sri Lanka Customs, rising to assistant superintendent, and his colleagues there put on a concert for him called ",[54,297,298],{},"Sisirasa","; the Customs Welfare Association also published his felicitation volume, ",[54,301,302],{},"Sisiraesa",", edited by Vijitha Gunaratne, which contains George Robinson de Silva's ",[54,305,306],{},"Sisira Senaratne Gee Mina"," — described at the time as the only reliable catalogue of the couple's songs.",[12,309,310,311,52,314,317,318,321,322,325],{},"With Indrani he took a concert programme called ",[27,312,313],{},"සිසින්ද්‍රා",[54,315,316],{},"Sisindra"," around the Sri Lankan diaspora for years — Canada, Britain, the United States, Dubai, Australia, Germany, Switzerland, Italy — and finally staged its Sri Lankan edition at the Kularatne Hall of Ananda College, Colombo, launching Indrani's autobiography ",[54,319,320],{},"Ranpiyawara"," and an album of their duets, ",[54,323,324],{},"Iresha",", on the same night. The book covers fifty-five years of a shared working life.",[12,327,328],{},"Professor Sunil Ariyaratne, assessing him after his death, put the durability down to a voice and a stage personality that belonged to nobody else. He had been ill for some time when he died at the National Hospital of Sri Lanka on 4 February 2015, aged seventy-nine; the funeral was at Borella cemetery three days later. Indrani outlived him by four years.",[16,330,332],{"id":331},"a-note-on-the-name","A note on the name",[12,334,335,336,87,339,91,342,345,346,349,350,30],{},"Anyone searching Sinhala sources for him should know that the romanisation is unstable — ",[54,337,338],{},"Senaratne",[54,340,341],{},"Senarathne",[54,343,344],{},"Senarathna"," all appear, sometimes for the same recording — and that ",[27,347,348],{},"Sisira Senevirathna",", who also sang in this period, is a different person entirely. The Sinhala form is settled: ",[27,351,352],{},"සිසිර සේනාරත්න",{"title":354,"searchDepth":355,"depth":355,"links":356},"",2,[357,358,359,360,361,362],{"id":18,"depth":355,"text":19},{"id":44,"depth":355,"text":45},{"id":136,"depth":355,"text":137},{"id":233,"depth":355,"text":234},{"id":291,"depth":355,"text":292},{"id":331,"depth":355,"text":332},"29 March 1935","The customs officer who wrote his own melodies while everyone around him was borrowing Hindi ones, and who with his wife Indrani Wijebandara made the songs Sri Lankan children still learn.","4 February 2015","1950s-2010s","md","\u002Fimages\u002Fpeople\u002Fsisira-senaratne.webp","Sarindu89 (Wikimedia Commons)","CC BY-SA 4.0","https:\u002F\u002Fcommons.wikimedia.org\u002Fwiki\u002FFile:Sirira_Senaratne_portrait.jpg",{},true,"\u002Fen\u002Fpeople\u002Fsisira-senaratne",[376,377,378,379],"Singer","Lyricist","Composer","Music Director",{"title":5,"description":364},[382,385,388,391,394,397],{"title":383,"url":384},"Sisira Senaratne — Wikipedia","https:\u002F\u002Fen.wikipedia.org\u002Fwiki\u002FSisira_Senaratne",{"title":386,"url":387},"සිසිර සේනාරත්න — සිංහල විකිපීඩියා","https:\u002F\u002Fsi.wikipedia.org\u002Fwiki\u002F%E0%B7%83%E0%B7%92%E0%B7%83%E0%B7%92%E0%B6%BB_%E0%B7%83%E0%B7%9A%E0%B6%B1%E0%B7%8F%E0%B6%BB%E0%B6%AD%E0%B7%8A%E0%B6%B1",{"title":389,"url":390},"Sisira's melodious songs still mesmerise listeners — Sunday Observer, 4 January 2015","http:\u002F\u002Farchives.sundayobserver.lk\u002F2015\u002F01\u002F04\u002Fmon11.asp",{"title":392,"url":393},"සිසිර හඬ නිහඬ වෙයි (Sisira's voice falls silent) — BBC Sinhala, 4 February 2015","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.bbc.com\u002Fsinhala\u002Fsri_lanka\u002F2015\u002F02\u002F150204_sisira_singer",{"title":395,"url":396},"Sisira Senaratne — films.lk, Digital Identity of Sinhala Cinema","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.films.lk\u002Fsinhala-cinema-artist-sisira-senaratne-1550.html",{"title":398,"url":399},"Sarasaviya Awards 1966 — Best Music Direction: Sisira Senaratne, Handapana","http:\u002F\u002Farchives.sarasaviya.lk\u002Fawards\u002F?fn=1966","en\u002Fpeople\u002Fsisira-senaratne","aiCkpR5IL5TcEj0K7qDB3__PruKPBmgqPdWR9XUxrxk",1787999333645]