THE MOUNTAIN OF THE WOMEN: Memoirs of an Irish Troubadour

Now in his 60s, acclaimed Irish folk musician Clancy masterfully recounts more than "40 years of acting, singing and great foolishness" with a powerful, melodic voice and guileless magnetism. The author's emotion is as unmistakable as his brogue when he describes his childhood (at times overshadowed by provincialism, Catholicism and adversity) as the youngest of 11 in tiny Carrick-on-Suir, Ireland. He reflects on the heartrending effect of a sibling's death on his mother, the pain of first love, a young friend's drowning and the unfortunate circumstances of his first daughter's birth; yet he balances these recollections with sheer joy as he speaks of his lifelong passion for poetry and theater. "Discovered" in the mid-1950s by American heiress Diane Guggenheim, Clancy eventually joined his two brothers, already a part of the Irish diaspora living in the U.S., and settled in New York City. There, he co-created Tradition Records, bankrolled by Guggenheim, and formed the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem band. Despite a conviction to act and several well-received plays in Cambridge, Mass., music inevitably took priority, and while the band made it big, Clancy "rampaged through the females of Greenwich Village," escaped to the White Horse Tavern (immortalized by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas) and had brushes with Lenny Bruce, Bob Dylan and Barbra Streisand along the way. Snippets of original music, as well as several full-length songs, help segue between subject matter in this production, while underscoring the tremendous sentimentality of specific passages. This is a superbly recorded, albeit abridged, performance; the content (both spoken and musical) is at once brilliant, funny and sad. Simultaneous release with the Doubleday hardcover (Forecasts, Dec. 17, 2001). (Feb. 19)