'I am just off work for a few days. I am working in a factory. This is escapism for me. It is getting away from Dublin and techno music. It is a bit more wild and raw," says Dinny Cannon, a Dublin-based engineer, who's at the 29th Willie Clancy Summer School in Miltown Malbay, Co Clare. Now a music festival in all but name, it attracts the best of musicians, students and aficionados for a nine-day celebration of traditional music.
It is an unusual festival. The organisers refuse major corporate sponsorship. There are no Budweiser, Heineken or Guinness banners or hoardings, the west Clare town pulls off an annual miracle in accommodating thousands of national and international visitors and there is little trouble on the streets.
During the mornings, classes are held for players of fiddles, tin whistles, flutes, concertinas, accordions and uilleann pipes, the instrument played by the late Willie Clancy in whose honour the summer school is held. A carpenter by trade, he died in 1973 while still in his 50s. The pipes are also the only instrument for which beginners' classes are held.
But many turn up for the sessions which begin at midday and continue beyond midnight in the town's 17 pubs, In one lunchtime session, accordionist Johnny O'Leary and fiddler Paddy Cronin play in the Slieve Luachra style which is later discussed in a three-hour public lecture. Later on, the quality may suffer and one bodhrβn player sings Spancil HillGhost Riders in the Sky.
But it is the music's relaxed style which attacts many. Fiddles are the most popular instrument and there are 26 separate classes for 406 students. Classical musician Hiloko Kato, from Switzerland but of Japanese descent, likes to get away from the style she grew up with. She is in an advanced class with tutor Tony Linnane. "It is quite different, but I like it. It is not as serious a way to play the music."
East Clare fiddler Martin Hayes, who is now Seattle-based, says he has been attending the school for more than 10 years as a tutor but also came to the school as a child with his father, the late P. Joe Hayes. Last weekend, Martin played at Sharon Corr's wedding in Cratloe before bringing some of the party on to Miltown Malbay. "I do not spend much time in the sessions. I primarily come to teach," he says.
Down the corridor from him in the convent school at Spanish Point is Cathal Goan, director of television with RTE, who is conducting a course on the roots of Irish music. He does it "for the love of it", he says. "I have just done an hour and a half on various singing styles in Irish and Paddy Glackin is going to be talking about fiddle styles. People from America and France and Ireland want to find out a wee bit more about Irish music."
The school's administrative director, Muiris O Rochain, says the school is put on at a cost of about £100,000, with the minimum of administration. The 1,500 students enrol on arrival, paying £65 for classes.
More than two thirds will return the following year. The Arts Council is a major contributor, but the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the British Council also sponsor the school.
The informality is what everybody loves. "That is what the festival is all about, having time for people. The day we have hierarchical structures, we are finished," O Rochain says.
The summer school continues until Sunday
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