ග්රේෂන් ආනන්ද
22 songs performed · 1 composition
Greshan Ananda (ග්රේෂන් ආනන්ද, also romanized Gratien Ananda or Gration Ananda) was a Sri Lankan playback singer, composer and lyricist whose warm, soul-inflected voice carried the soundtracks of hundreds of Sinhala films across the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s. Born Bajjala Walawwe Gretien Ananda Abeykoon, he was one of the most prolific cinema vocalists of his generation, often spoken of in the same breath as the playback singers who shaped Sinhala film music after H. R. Jothipala.
Ananda was born on 15 March 1957 in Tangalle, in the Hambantota District of southern Sri Lanka. Music ran through the household: his mother was a piano-playing music teacher, and he took early training in Eastern classical music under the composer Sarath Dassanayake. He drew on pop, soul and rhythm and blues as much as on Sinhala light music, and that blend gave his singing its distinctive smoothness.
From the mid-1970s onward, Gratien Ananda worked steadily as a film playback singer, lending his voice to songs across a very large number of Sinhala productions. He recorded both as a solo voice and in duets with leading singers of the day, including Neela Wickramasinghe, Uresha Ravihari and Milton Mallawarachchi. He twice won the Sarasaviya Award for Best Male Vocalist, in 1994 and again in 2007, and in 2006 he received a special honour from Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican for his work.
Greshan Ananda is remembered for tender, melancholy ballads such as Sihina Ahase Wasanthe and Bindu Bindu Kandulu Gala, both of which remain favourites among listeners who grew up on his cinema recordings. His reading of Adara Seenuwa and the duet Manaliyak Sanda Wage show the same gift for shaping a simple melodic line so that the words land. The romanized spelling Gratien Ananda appears on much of his official discography, so the same artist turns up under both names.
Ananda died on 29 December 2010 in Colombo at the age of 53. He left behind a deep catalogue of film songs that the Sri Lankan diaspora still returns to, and his recordings remain a fixture of Sinhala oldies playlists. Whether listed as Greshan or Gratien Ananda, his name stands for a particular kind of unforced, emotionally direct film singing.
Every Sinhala lyric, composition, and song credit by Greshan Ananda.
Performed by: Mervin Perera (මර්වින් පෙරේරා)