As Mickey prepares to take to the stage tonight in the finals of the prestigious Toyota Star Maker competition, his younger sister Clancy has been named the Aristocrat Entertainer of the Year. 

The duo have been performing together throughout the Tamworth Country Music Festival.

It’s a rare treat these days for the young Oberon musicians, who have each been concentrating on their own music in recent years.

Clancy said she and Mickey have been playing pub gigs together since she was 13, although both had been playing guitar long before that. They started out as The Party Pyes and later performed in the band Stoked. 

Clancy, 22, received $2000 and 10 hours of recording time as the winner of the Entertainer of the Year competition. 

Performers are judged not only on their musical ability, but also their presentation, the way they engage the crowd and their dress.

“I don’t think I’d have won if it was only judged on vocal artistry,” she laughed.

“But I think playing pubs almost every weekend helped because you have to work hard to keep people happy.”

One of the judges was Australian country music favourite Beccy Cole, which Clancy said was exciting and a little intimidating.

She said that winning time in a recording studio will give her an incredible opportunity.

While she has recorded with other musicians before, she has never had the chance to record her own songs.

“My goal this year will be to spend more time on my songwriting,” she said. 

Clancy has just finished her physiotherapy degree and will soon be starting work in Orange.

“Over the last five years I have done a lot of solo gigs on the weekend in Bathurst, Orange and Mudgee,” she said.

“It was nice to do that and it paid my way through uni.”

She said it was great to have the opportunity to play pub gigs in Tamworth with her brother over the past couple of weeks.

“We’ve played together our whole lives.

“When we were younger we played at a lot of community gigs – I was about six at the time.

“My brother was that little bit older, so he’s passed a lot of his knowledge on to me.

“He’s teaching professionally now, so I try to tap into that every now and then.”

Clancy said the whole family will join them in Tamworth today to cheer Mickey on as he performs in the competition that turned Keith Urban, Lee Kernaghan and local girl Kaylee Bell into big names. 

“We are so proud of him for making it this far,” Clancy said.