Abstract:
Cyril de Silva Kulatillake was a pioneering Sri Lankan ethnomusicologist. In
the late 1970s and early 1980s, he embarked on a journey to document Sri
Lankan music using reel-to-reel audio tapes, travelling to numerous villages.
This paper concerns the restoration and preservation of a part of the
Kulatillake field recordings. The study restored the open reel tape recordings
and carefully digitized the soundtracks. Each tape was meticulously examined
and cleaned; and the tape containers and accompanying notes were
documented and photographed. Once digitized, the recordings, which
represent various ethnic groups in Sri Lanka, were catalogued. The collection
captures a rich tapestry of Sinhala and Tamil songs, Portuguese Burghers’
baila songs and Veddas’ ancestral tunes, offering a soundscape of Sri Lanka’s
immaterial cultural heritage.
