Pasquel Wasam Ananda Keerthirathna (born January 29, 1956), known professionally as Keerthi Pasquel (Sinhala: කීර්ති පැස්කුවල්:) is a veteran pop musician and composer from Kandy, Sri Lanka. He has been performing for more than three decades and has won a number of awards. Keerthi is a judge on the National reality show ‘Derana Dream Star’ and sets the record as the only judge in Sri Lanka to sit for 10 consecutive seasons in a reality show beginning from 2008 until today. He has been active in music education and in social welfare.
Early life
Keerthi Pasquel was born in the city of Hanthana, Kandy as the youngest of four older siblings. His parents were S. W. Leslin and Pasquel Wasam Gayaneris. His older siblings are Nalini, Rukmani Chandra, Padmasiri and Chitrani. Keerthi studied at Dharmaraja College up until his GCE O/level examination. Keerthi's passion for music was greatly influenced by his family where he grew up amidst soothing music all around his home. The melodious singing prowess of his mother was a huge influence on Keerthi. His father could play the harmonium. Keerthi was just ten years old when his father developed an illness and eventually passed away, eventually leaving his mother to shoulder the responsibility of five children as well as taking over her husband's business. Keerthi's mother's dream was to make him a doctor but he started to follow a course on lathe machinery at the Technical College, after his O Levels.
His brother Padmasiri Pasquel was the first member of the family to bring a guitar to their home. He had joined a group called ‘Halians’ where he played the lead guitar. But Padmasiri never allowed Keerthi to touch the instrument, because he feared the boy might neglect studies if he focused on music. He had three cousin brothers – Bandula, Lalith and Ranjith, who frequently patronized their home to learn the guitar from Padmasiri. So Keerthi started learning about guitar chords from Bandula, on the sly. Gradually, Keerthi learnt the guitar secretly. He took part in school concerts as he could sing well.
When he was in Grade 9, the school had a talent contest and Keerthi was the obvious choice in the singing segment. He even trained the final ten students with whom he himself competed. The grand finale was held at the Kandy Buddhist Centre. Keerthi sang Victor Rathnayake's ‘Adawan Desin’. Unfortunately for him, the music orchestra backing him gave a low tempo and the song finally ended up like a poem. All his hopes of winning the contest were smashed. The guys whom he taught overtook him. But he never gave up.
Having learnt the guitar from Bandula, Keerthi and a few teenage friends formed a small musical group which played at functions but was never paid. One day, Keerthi's group was invited to perform at a wedding. Riyaldeen, having heard about Keerthi's exceptional skills, invited him to join a group headed by Stanley Peiris as a bass guitarist. The band was named ‘GALAXIES’.
When Keerthi was attending the technical course, he tried to join the Army band and went for interviews too. He was called for training during this period. But when he told this to Stanley Peiris, he had asked him to remain in the band as the bass guitarist.
Career
As time went on, Keerthi became a permanent member of the 'Galaxies'. Though Keerthi played the bass guitar, at these recordings he was given small percussion instruments like maracas, clappers, triangle and bells. Keerthi was invited by Gretian Ananda to play the bass guitar for four new songs he was planning to record. Rookantha to be on the keyboard, Sarath Wickrema the accordion and Mahinda Bandara was slotted for the lead. The first milestone song was ‘ Etha Duraka Desa Pawela’.
Later on, Keerthi befriended Thilak Dias who had a unique playing style with the guitar with a gifted knack of playing it with his fingers giving an exceptional output. Since then Keerthi, being intrigued by Thilak's style, also used this finger style on the bass guitar for all his recordings and he started getting more recordings as a bass guitarist. In addition to Stanley Peiris, Keerthi was fortunate to get work in the recordings of Sarath Dassanayake, Rohana Weerasinghe and other veterans of the time. He was invited to join Patrick Denipitiya's Combo as a bass guitarist and vocalist singing songs of Clarence Wijewardana, Amaradewa, Nihal Nelson, Neville Fernando, Nanda Malini, Rukmani Devi and a host of others. This, he did even with Galaxies. Keerthi always believes that his present vocal prowess is blessed with a blend of all such great singers. He played as the bass guitar for Mount Chimes too.