theartsdesk from Colombo: A Pianist of the World

Since winning the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka Concerto Competition at the tender (and record-setting) age of 16, Tanya Ekanayaka has become one of Sri Lanka’s pre-eminent concert pianists. Last month she was the first from her country ever to appear in the long-running Pianists of the World series at St Martin-in-the-Fields, with a programme featuring Bach, Beethoven, Ravel and her own improvised composition, Adahas: of Wings of Roots.

A Fellow of Trinity College London and Licentiate of both the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM), she gave her first solo recital in 2002, and has since gone on to perform widely in Sri Lanka, as well as in Edinburgh where she is now in the final stages of an interdisciplinary PhD (she is almost certainly the only concert pianist to have a paper in Proceedings of the 16th International Himalayan Languages Symposium). There she teaches performance to the BMus course as well as lecturing on popular culture and linguistics. 

Now she tells theartsdesk about her London debut, the relationship between music and linguistics, and how she learned to hum before she could talk.

Tell us how you came to be one of the Pianists of the World.

I have no idea how this happened! I was in touch, already, with the organisers of the series. Then they wrote to me and asked if I’d come and give a concert. There’s never been a Sri Lankan in the Pianists of the World series before – though I believe someone did perform at St Martin’s itself, in the late Eighties or early Nineties (something connected with the ABRSM).

And how did you find it?

The experience for me was lovely. I enjoyed playing – I usually do. I mean, I wouldn’t even use the term "performing". It’s the playing itself.

You can enjoy playing in the rehearsal room as much as in the concert hall?

Yes, I get as much pleasure out of playing in a room with no-one around. It’s a different feeling, obviously, a different pleasure. There isn’t the adrenaline, the certain buzz of performing for an audience. But it’s a different type of enjoyment.

How did you feel about performing your own composition?

They encouraged me to play something of my own, which I’ve never done before. I would never have dared to suggest it myself, let alone playing there!

And it was a world premiere.

Yes, Adahas was created specifically for that recital. I had been vaguely talking to the organisers about these kind of improvised pieces, soundscapes, integrating different sounds. I was amused by the implied dissonance of the Bach [Prelude and Fugue No 7] being in E flat, the Beethoven [Sonata No 15 (Pastoral)] in D and the Ravel [Jeux d’eau] in E, and wanted to bring those elements together – the central motif of the piece is E flat, D, E and E flat – in synergy with elements of Sri Lankan traditional music.

I don’t see music as being separable, belonging to different musical traditions. So Adahas refers to the rest of the programme – an homage – as well as to my own musical heritage. [Programme note: “‘Adahas’ is a Sinhala word and translates as 'thoughts'. 'Roots' represents the dichotomous sources of the composition. 'Wings' is a metaphor for the re-inventions entailed in the appropriation and amalgamation of these sources.”]

So the piece doesn’t exist on paper?

No. Or not yet, anyway. I didn’t really conceptualise it beyond a kind of main framework. The piece evolved in about 15 minutes, then I revised it over a couple of days – to fit the time constraints of the recital as much as anything. I had an idea of wanting to draw on something Sri Lankan [she ended up sourcing nursery rhyme and traditional song], but I didn’t sit and think about what exactly that should be. I don’t analyse like that.

It’s instinctive?

Yes. I have absolutely no idea what’s going to come out of my hands. Yesterday, for example, I found myself playing something: it was clearly connected with something else, drawing on another piece, and then someone knocked on the door, and it was gone.

Tanya Ekanayaka plays her Adahas: of Wings of Roots at St Martin's (YouTube):

Is Adahas one of a set?

There are lots of little pieces that are created, but that I haven’t performed in a public context. I have a vague plan for half a concert’s worth of similar homage-studies, all with that same merging of diverse styles and rhythms.

Have you always had this capacity for improvisation?

Yes, my father used to tease me when I was improvising, saying, "You ought to be practising proper pieces." But creating is expressing oneself. Like speaking – creative output is like a language that comes through.

Were your parents musical?

Very. I grew up with music 24/7. I used to wake up to it and fall asleep to it. My father played music all the time.

In person, or he played records?

Records. He is deeply interested in classical music: he listens very actively. He’s an amateur violinist, too. He used to play duets with my mother, romanzes and so on. My mother is a piano teacher. I used to be put on a mat while she was teaching. Apparently I started humming along to pieces – before I learned to speak!

When did you start playing?

When I was five. My parents were strict. Got me to lessons, made me practise when I’d rather have been out playing in a muddy field, though once I’d got to about 12 [the age at which she made her first public recital appearance], I didn’t need to be coerced any more. But though they were very keen to make sure I had secure technique, of course, they also wanted to see me develop my own creative expression. I was taught with a whole range of methods, including Suzuki. I was an experiment, basically.

Is there a link between your unwillingness to see music parcelled up and categorised and your interest in linguistic cross-fertilisation?

Yes – and it’s interesting that you ask that. It’s clearly just how my brain works. I knit stuff together all the time. And blending things to this extent owes a lot to my PhD. How people knit stuff together in speech and music.

Tell us about your PhD – in no more than 10 words.

Well, the context is Sri Lanka, and language-mixing in popular songs. Sinhala and English. It’s based on socio-linguistic research into how people perceive language-mixing. But I’ve evolved a theory of analysing these, drawing on musical structure to explain what’s going on.

What counts as popular song, for the sake of your study?

Sri Lankan pop, fusion, hip hop. There’s no catch-all genre term, but we’re talking about Iraj, BNS, the local megastars.

M.I.A. doesn’t make the cut?

No, only music originating in the Sri Lankan local context. This is about how places blend their local culture with international, global culture. Take Japanese hip hop and Nigerian hip hop, for example, and the different ways in which the English language has been resourced because of their different histories…

How did you get into linguistics?

After my BA in English Lit I joined the linguistics staff at the University of Peradeniya. Then I came to Edinburgh to do my MSc. But my interest in linguistics stretches at least as far back as my schooldays. I could never relate to questions like "What’s your first language?" I spoke English at home, but studied in Sinhala (at least up until A-level). But both languages were there, integrated, both part of my identity.

This is a tricky subject area in Sri Lanka, though, surely?

Yes, it’s very controversial, because of the sociological aspects. There are very prescriptive views on what should be, or should not be. Language and identity are very closely linked - and then there’s religion, and ideology… Perhaps this is why there’s been very little academic research in this field.

What are your plans, once your PhD is completed?

Well, I’m still on the staff at Peradeniya, and there’s more research I’d like to do in the Sri Lankan context. Musically, I’d like to be involved there too; but it’s not easy. There’s not much opportunity, or inspiration. And there’s very limited scope for real development.

Til then, when’s your next gig?

I’ll be performing another solo recital there on 5 October, a repeat of the St Martin’s programme. There’s a series of concerts in the Reid Concert Hall, which is part of the university. Generally, the performers are outside professionals, but the head of Performance Studies invited me. I’m looking forward to it.

Tanya Ekanayaka plays the 3rd movement of Beethoven's Pastoral piano sonata in D, op 28 (YouTube):