A callow youth of fifteen years, I had been brought up in a rumbustious environment of a boy’s school in a rural town which it was then without pretensions to being the capital of the Kandyan kingdom. But in that provincial school I had been destined to be tutored in Kandyan dancing by the best in the world - Nittawela Gunaya Gurunanse.

And here was I, during the vacations, worshipping every robust movement of a supple and masculine frame and also the limpid movements of his protege, Vajira.

Chitrasena’s ashram in Kollupitiya was a hive of activity with the rituals of dance and music reverberating in the immediate vicinity. Privy to the intensity of the muses, I was stirred to achieve something within my means. Having realized against Roland Aluvihare and Chandra Munasinghe that I did not have the fluidity of Kandyan genes to perform in the ‘eloquence’ of Dance, I turned my attention to the limpid poetry of Byron, Keats and Shelley, stirred liberally with that of the lesser poets, Burns, Cowper, et al.

These early escapades in the realms of the sublime to which I was ushered by Chitrasena and his entourage have swelled within me a thirsting appreciation of the fine arts.

All the demi-gods of their chosen disciplines converged at Chitrasena’s ashram - Chitrasena’s brother, the volatile Sarathsena on the drums, Sesha Pallihakkara of the twinkling steps epitomatic of Rama, Edmund Samaradiwakara and Amaradeva, Albert Perera as he was then, on violin and sitar, Sunil Santha, Ananda Samarakone, Chitra and Somapala of the lilting vocals and Chirasena, himself, as the lord Avatar who would romp the stage as the heroic figures of the deathless dance; and Vajira, blooming into the premiere danseuse of the country.

With such an array of maestros it was inevitable that Chitrasena would blaze new horizons across the stages of the world.

Chitrasena infused a dynamism to the art. The effusion was qualitative. He distilled and blended the cultural, spiritual and historical components of the Kandyan, Sabaragamuwa, Low Country and Kohomba Kankariya dance themes in a mix that had stunning effect to captivate spellbound aficionados all over the civilized world where dance is worshipped.

Vidura in 1945 was his first venture, followed by the glittering Kinkini, Nala Damayanthi, Nirthanjali which were theatre at its opulent best with a wide repertoire of folk dances of every conceivable scope and type; and Karadiya, which certainly remains as his piece de resistance. All in all, he staged over thirty ballets and as John Gregory has observed, "he ploughed a new furrow."

As the son of Seebert Dias Amaratunga, the pioneering king-pin of classical drama and nephew of Sir Baron Jayatillake, he had the muse in his genes.

Shanti Niketan honed his art and he was determined to seek in the dark caverns, the gems of our traditional culture; and he was destined to be crowned in glory. As Nihal Ratnaike has written, "Chitrasena took dance and infused theatre into it …… highly polished form of modern theatre entertainment …… condensed 2,500 years of traditionally rhythmic movements into modern theatre."

Vajira cannot be denied her spot in this essay. She was a wisp of a teen-aged girl when she came under Chitrasena’s wings.I would watch her constantly at rehearsals and how tenderly the Master guided her and finally, as Bandula Jayawardena has said better than I ever can, "Out of the firmament of an experimental phase emerged Sri Lanka’s most accomplished ballerina, Vajira, with her natural talents and her ideally balletic figure."

Chitrasena packed his wherewithal and moved with his dignity intact to Mahara which is, coincidentally, cheek by jowl from where I have lived.