William P. Dooley
Dear Friends,
It is with heavy hearts that we inform you of the passing of our beloved brother and longtime bandmate Bill Dooley. On Monday November 4th he died peacefully at his home surrounded by his family after a heroic battle with cancer.
Having been married for 55 years, Bill was a dedicated family man, and had five children and six grandchildren. He was also a superb singer, guitarist and songwriter, and an accomplished pastel artist.
As to the musical side of him, Bill started out singing at home with his brothers harmonizing and recording the popular doo-wop songs of the 1950s on a Webcor reel-to-reel tape recorder that our father had given us one Christmas. Appreciating all kinds of music, Bill and his brothers moved on to harmonizing barbershop quartet music and singing the songs of the Kingston Trio and many other folk music artists of the day. As the sixties rolled on, Bill was particularly influenced by the songs and 12 string guitar playing of renowned folk musician, Bob Gibson. Bill would have the good fortune to befriend him and make music with him in the years to follow.
In 1967, Bill, along with brothers Joe and Jim, founded the original Dooley musical group known at the time as “The Dooley Boys”. They performed at colleges and various coffeehouses and nightclubs in and around Chicago especially in the Old Town and Rush Street areas. A few years later youngest brother Mike joined the group and the four of them became known as “The Dooley Brothers.” This aggregation would go on to perform at thousands of venues in the ensuing decades. Other Dooley family members joined the band in recent years including Bill’s nephew Mick and Bill’s niece Claire. Through all of those years Bill performed and recorded with the band until several years ago when he had to cut back due to health issues.
Bill had a beautiful singing voice on the lead vocal and also was particularly adept at figuring out and blending that tricky third vocal harmony part in the ensemble. His playing on the 6-string and 12-string guitars was always solid and he had a unique finger-picking style all his own. A prolific songwriter on varied subjects, his most requested song was “Black Sunshine”, a whimsical tune extolling the virtues of espresso coffee.
Bill was of course a talented musician but most of all of all we remember our brother Bill as a kind, compassionate and gentle soul who has always been an inspiration to us about how to live our lives well.
God bless you Bill and thank you for all you gave us.
The Dooleys
Jim, Mike, Mick & Claire
There are numerous photos of Bill from childhood up to recent times on our website in the Archives section.
If you would like to listen to some songs featuring Bill, click on the links for Spotify and You Tube
on the home page of our website. http://www.dooleybrothers.com
On Spotify:
Black Sunshine (original song written by Bill)
So Do I
On You Tube:
I Remember You
Chilly Winds