100-year-old Opelousas fiddler is a living link to the past Willie Durisseau continues style considered long gone

Herman Fuselier | The Daily Advertiser

Show Caption Hide Caption Creole Fiddler, WWII Vet a Living Link to the Past (1) Willie Durriseau, 100, plays Creole fiddle at his home in Opelousas, La. Durriseau, a World War II veteran, plays a bluesy style considered long forgotten.

I had to reread the email from James Adams to make sure I understood. My longtime friend from Houston wrote he discovered a 100-year-old, Creole fiddler living in Opelousas.

Say what? I’ve never known Adams to drink, but I started to wonder. I checked the calendar to make sure it wasn’t April 1.

Adams is like many of us who thought the last of the original Creole fiddlers were buried when the casket closed on Canray Fontenot in 1995 and Carlton Frank in 2005. Their scratchy, bluesy style, which influenced zydeco and Cajun music, can be traced back to the 17th century, when slaves from Haiti arrived in south Louisiana.

In contemporary zydeco, the ever-popular accordion has virtually erased the fiddle from the music. Ed Poullard, a 66-year-old Eunice native and Beaumont, Texas, resident who learned from Fontenot, was believed to be the oldest living practitioner.

But even Poullard is excited with Adams’ discovery of a surviving link to Creole fiddling’s past. His name is Willie Durisseau, who turned 100 on Feb. 20. He still plays the old Creole style, as much as his arthritic fingers let him.

Born in Mallet and raised in LeBeau, both in St. Landry Parish, Durisseau played fiddle at the rural house dances of the 1930s. He has memories of Creole accordion greats Amédé Ardoin and Wilfred Lazard, aka “Ezeb.” Older generations around Opelousas have said “Ezeb” taught zydeco king Clifton Chenier how to play.

Durisseau never recorded, but played at dances throughout the area in a band with his cousins, Aaron, Clarence and Caffery Joe. He taught himself how to play on a fiddle he made from a cigar box.

The fiddle and house dances introduced him to his wife, Irma, who still cooks at 92. They’ll celebrate their 76th wedding anniversary Aug. 26.

Durisseau’s fiddle was quiet when he served four years in the United States Army during World War II. He recalls some combat in Okinawa and said: “I never got hurt. I was lucky for that. I seen a lot of them that got hurt.”

Durisseau returned to Louisiana in 1946 and enrolled in trade school in 1951. He began a lifetime of work in construction and other manual labor to support a family of 14 children.

“When he’d leave to go work on the pipelines, he’d tell me, 'Make sure you buy food for them children,’" said Irma Durisseau. “That’s why he’s living so long. He made sure he’d leave money here for the children.“

“I raised about 20 children. I helped my daughters with theirs when they went to college.”

The Durisseaus are living history books. Adams is on a campaign to make sure their long lives are documented.

He’s already discovered that Durisseau has a brick in the Honor Walk-Way at the St. Landry Parish Veterans Memorial. Adams is working to connect him with the Honor Flight Network, which flies surviving WWII veterans to Washington, D.C.

Adams is hoping cultural activists will recognize his link to the roots of local music.

“I believe he should not be kept hidden,” said Adams. “I’m going to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Herman Fuselier is music and entertainment writer for the Times of Acadiana and Daily Advertiser. Contact him at hfuselier@theadvertiser.com.