Meet Sandy Knox

We had the good fortune of connecting with Sandy Knox and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Sandy, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My thought process behind writing and releasing “Weighting, My Life if it Were a Musical” was to have a storyline that was cohesive with the songs that I wanted to write to support the storyline. Sometimes the hooks for the songs were born out of what I had written for the narration and other times the hook idea then songs came first and I built the story to serve the song. For me, there’s a golden hour in the very early morning, about 6 to 9am, that are just prime for writing because your mind is very very open and clear and the creative process flows so much easier at that time of day for me.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Weighting, My Life if it Were a Musical is truly one of my proudest accomplishments. From the time the seed was planted in my mind, until the day that it was completely finished and then released out into the world, was over 20 years. It is a semi-autobiographical story about a diet-center retreat that I attended in my mid 30s when I wanted to take a healthy vacation and maybe lose a few pounds. While I was there, I met so many interesting people who were at the facility for various reasons. That experience set in to motion that this setting, possibly, had a good solid foundation for a concept of a musical… and in the story, the fictional diet center is actually called Foundation House.

Anytime you embark on a career that is not guaranteed, especially something in the Arts, Music, Theatre or Dance, anything in the creative field, there are going to be challenges…so no, it wasn’t easy. There were some very tough times when, even working two or three jobs at a time, I was barely getting by financially. But I knew I could always get a job. I could always work and would pay my bills. I had to sacrifice a lot of things along the way.

As far as lessons being learned…unfortunately, you also meet some people who may say they have your best interest in mind but they really don’t. You learn pretty quickly to veer away from these kind of people. One of the things that I’ve learned is to trust my gut instinct. The first person who needed to believe in me…was me. If I believed in a project or a song, I stood beside it and continued to champion it to the end. Even if there was a possibility of failure, I would learn from that failure. I would take something away from that experience that would lead me to success, eventually, in the future. There were many times that someone said “Nobody is going to cut that song or that song is too sad.” A good example is “She Thinks His Name Was John.” The entire song is about a woman dying of AIDS. There is no repeating chorus and it does not have a happy ending. Many of my co-writers declined to even work on it, but I did believe in the song so I persevered and got it written. Very soon after it was demo’d it was cut by Reba McEntire and it became a critically acclaimed and very important song in the world of music and in HIV/AIDS awareness.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I am someone who loves museums so I would definitely suggest the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the Musicians Hall of Fame. We also have the National Museum of African-American Music, which is a fascinating historical learning experience.

And as far as restaurants, Nashville has really great restaurants but my favorite places are the grab and go places. I am a regular at Tinwings, The Food Company in Green Hills and another one out in Belle Meade called Something Special.

There are so many interesting places in Middle Tennessee. The town of Franklin is historic, lovely and charming.

Nashville has got such a deep and beautiful soul that is rooted in the music community. I would suggest visitors discover which songwriters are performing in and about town. You can go hear some of the finest songwriters in the world. Most of our venues are in casual settings so you can hear the writers performing their hits in a comfortable and laidback surrounding. You can hear the stories behind the songs, how the songs came about and how they made their way to becoming a hit. Songwriters are very important here in Nashville and we know it because this town tells us, supports us and therefore we feel the love. That is one of the reasons Nashville is my forever home. It is truly magical.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My goodness that question involves so many people along the way. I have to say that my mom and dad should get a rousing round of applause for recognizing that I had a powerful imagination coupled with a strong and determined creative bone. They encouraged and supported that by directing my energy toward getting me involved in activities like Ballet, Tap and theater classes. Then when I was in 6th grade, I discovered that I had a gift for singing. So then my focus became choir, theater and taking voice lessons. There were several teachers along the way that I still have to give a heartfelt shout out to like Jean Hinkle, Kathy Scandrett, R.L. Cook and my choir teacher in high school, Coloma Lafferty. Miss Lafferty was extremely hard on me which prepared me for how tough the journey ahead of me would be.

Website: https://weighting.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/weightingofficial

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61576932699838

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@weightingofficial

Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@weightingofficial

Image Credits
Sandy Knox headshot (with donut) photo credit Libby Danforth
All other images courtesy Sandy Knox