Andy Offutt Irwin

American singer songwriter (born 1957)

Andy Offutt Irwin (born December 14, 1957) is an American storyteller, singer songwriter, and humorist. Born and raised in Covington, Georgia, a small town outside of Atlanta, Irwin began his career in 1984 with an improvisational comedy troupe at Walt Disney World. After five years he shifted to performing as a singer songwriter, touring the Southeast. In the mid 1990s, Irwin branched into performances for children. Irwin continued to perform as a singer songwriter and added storytelling to these performances, usually telling one story (about ten to twenty five minutes in length) during a show. In the fall of 2004, he decided to pursue storytelling as a career and quickly achieved national prominence. Irwin now appears regularly in storytelling festivals across the United States. As of 2022, he has released 13 albums which feature stories, songs or whistling and has collected numerous awards for them. In 2013, Irwin received the Circle of Excellence Award from the National Storytelling Network.

Andy Offutt Irwin is a native of Covington, Georgia, a small town in the United States' Deep South about 35 miles east of Atlanta. As a youth, Irwin discovered his talent for imitating different sounds and the speech of others. Starting in 1984, Irwin spent five years writing, directing, and performing shows with the improvisational comedy troupe SAK Theatre at Disney World. Upon returning to Georgia, Irwin began to focus on singing and songwriting, though he always kept comedic elements in his music. Beginning in 1991, Irwin toured the Southeast as a singer songwriter. From 1995 to 2001, Irwin sang humorous songs, played guitar, and performed comedy as "Offutt the Minstrel" at the Georgia Renaissance Festival. He also performed at the Kansas City Renaissance Festival during the 1980s.

Prior to deciding to become a full time storyteller, Irwin worked as a comedian "for a few minutes". However, Irwin came to see that the days of storytelling comedians had passed. Irwin also realized that his style of performance was at odds with the main venue available to comedians today: comedy clubs. (Irwin joking refers to comedy clubs as "evil, smelly places".) Some of his stories are an hour in length, and Irwin notes, "[t]here was a time when comedians could do that but they can't anymore because the clubs give them three minutes, and they are timing the laughs per minute."

Many of Irwin's stories revolve around his fictional aunt, Dr. Marguerite Van Camp, whom he describes as being about 85 years old. She and her friends founded Southern White Old Lady Hospital in rural Georgia because (as Irwin explains in Marguerite's old lady voice) "all our husbands have moved on, and we were tired of the garden club and the bridge club and the ladies club. So Mary Frances and Julia and I all went back to medical school."