Contrary to what some people appear to believe, a living folk tradition is not anonymous or amorphous. It is characterised by the skill of its prophets and great performers who in every generation appear in those areas where the tradition is flourishing most vigorously. A hundred years ago and for a generation after his death, Garret Barry, the blind piper from Inagh, represented the soul of the traditional music of Clare. He is remembered to this day. In our own time in County Clare, Willie Clancy was by general acclamation given his hieratic cloak - he did not assume it himself. He was recognised in a special way as the true inheritor of the rich repertoire of County Clare musicians, and as the mentor of a new generation there.
Willie Clancy was born in 1918 near Miltown Malbay in County Clare. He was, from his earliest years, reared on traditional music: his father, Gilbert Clancy, played the flute and the concertina; his mother, Ellen Killeen, was also a concertina player and had a repertory of old songs which she sang in the traditional manner.
Willie had, through his father, a direct link with Garret Barry: Gilbert Clancy had known the blind piper and remembered much of his music which he passed on to his son.
However, Willie Clancy's musical experience was not only based on the folk memory of past generations. He had very considerable contact with his fellow musicians and was particularly influenced by the travelling piper Johnny Doran, who spent long periods in County Clare in the 1930s and early 1940s.
There was a collection of manuscripts in the Irish language in Willie Clancy's old home at Islandbawn outside Miltown Malbay and these he often handled even though he could not read them. He was filled with the spirit of the Gaelic tradition and it coloured his music in no small way. He could transfer the 'secret joinery' of Gaelic song to the pipes and tin whistle and even to his own singing in the English language.
Willie Clancy had a sense of humour, not all that common among pipers: he took his music seriously, but not himself. Although Willie Clancy died all too young in 1973, his influence is still very much alive. The Willie Clancy Summer School held annually in Miltown Malbay each July is one of the most important traditional music events of the year and a most fitting monument to him.
--Ciarán Mac Mathúna
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