On Wednesday, I'll be having a conversation with my long-time friend Andy Offutt Irwin, a beloved storyteller with a gift for poignant insight, compassion, and hilarity that literally leaves me breathless. 

With a silly putty voice, hilarious heart-filled stories, and amazing mouth noises (arguably, the greatest whistler in the world) one-person-showman, Andy Offutt Irwin, is equal parts mischievous schoolboy and the Marx Brothers, peppered with a touch of the Southern balladeer. 

One of the most sought after performing storytellers in the United States, Andy is especially known for relating the adventures of his eighty-five-year-old-widowed-newly-minted-physician-aunt, Marguerite Van Camp, a woman who avoids curmudgeonship by keeping her finger on the pulse of the changing world around her as she seeks to grow – even at her advanced age – in the New South.  Marguerite steps lively through this existence, loving as many people as she can.

I came to know Andy in the nineties, when we were both young songwriters, traveling and playing small rooms. He had a gift for quirk and humor, but like so many great performers I've met over the years, often used that humor to relax his audience enough that he could get to the heart of things. And there was a spirit of generosity about Andy that I've never seen waver. He has always supported the artists and others around him.

October of 2019 marked Andy’s tenth year as a Featured Teller at the National Storytelling Festival. He has appeared fourteen times as Teller in Residence at International Storytelling Center. Among other gigs, Andy has been a Guest Artist at La Guardia High School of Art, Music, and Performing Arts in New York (The “FAME!” School); keynoted conferences at venues as distinguished as the Library of Congress, and served as an Artist-In-Residence in Theatre at Emory University’s Oxford College from 1991 to 2007.

Andy is the recipient of many awards, including the Oracle Circle of Excellence Award from the National Storytelling Network.

Andy knows something about the relationship between humor and fear, and how music and stories can help to make us vulnerable enough to begin to heal. I can't wait to catch up with my friend Andy, and to share him with you. I hope you can join us.

Sustaining Our Spirits #16 - Andy Offutt Irwin, storyteller