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<< Previous   of   Next >> Sarah Huntington photo  (click to enlarge) Andrew McKnight   ADVERTISEMENT   Andrew McKnight 8 p.m. Saturday, Evergreen Unitarian Universal Fellowship, 1607 Fourth St., Marysville; benefit for Marysville Food Bank; 360-659-6621.   CONTACT THE HERALD Melanie Munk, Features Editor munk@heraldnet.com   Published: Friday, May 9, 2008 Andrew McKnight: Folksinger stands for something Andrew McKnight performs Saturday at a benefit for the Marysville Food Bank. By Sharon Wootton Special to The Herald When Andrew McKnight started work as an environmental engineer, he thought, "OK, I'm done hauling amps around in smoky bars at 3 a.m. I'm just going to play music for me!" He went to his day job and enjoyed himself on weekends in his small studio, writing, recording and having fun. "But the biggest mistake I made was playing some songs for people and it just snowballed," McKnight said. His company allowed him to take unpaid leave for some tours, and he performed at the Kennedy Center and the Olympic Village -- "You know, a chance to do something that most people only dream of." By the end of 1996, he was performing full time. McKnight performs Saturday in Marysville at a benefit for Marysville Food Bank with music from his latest CD, "Something Worth Standing For." McKnight sees a big difference between his previous recording, "Beyond Borders," and the new effort. "Borders" was like a family album, snapshots of places, touchstones to a specific time period. It reflected a period of intense personal matters, including losses of people close to him. It also was one of five Americana Album of the Year finalists in the 2005 Independent Music Awards; his song "Good Thing Matter" won the Great American Song Contest in the acoustic folk category. "I tried to transcend the individual human being and translate it into the more universal. Hence the worldly sounds of some of the songs," McKnight said. "Something Worth Standing For" is "very much an American album focused on life here at home. This album is where a patient man finally wound up out of patience, or someone who grew up and went through school and believing in American ideals … and finding frustration across the philosophical spectrum with the way things are going. "I wanted to channel that frustration that transcended political viewpoints but give people something to sink their teeth into. We've drifted, and we can be part of the problem or be part of the solution." McKnight recently became a father to Madeleine. While it's been a very personal experience, he recognizes the universal aspect, too. "I try to create bridges on the new album, trying to recapture what it must have been like for my parents … they surely thought the world was going mad -- (the assassinations of) JFK, MLK -- every new parent must have thought, 'What kind of world am I bringing my child into?' Whether they lived now or in caves with mastodons, they were thinking the same thing." Madeleine also changed another of her father's perceptions. "I used to be OK with my own mortality: 'If I have to go now at least I've left something of myself and done my best.' Now, it's completely so not OK. I've got important work here." A common thread of the last two albums has been McKnight's recognition of making small footsteps in a larger continuum. "I've always had a sense of what comes before and how it's lasted, as should any good storyteller, and I guess to me the idea of remembering things and maybe reinterpreting them in the current context and getting new meaning from them is important. Some stories I've told involved historical events," McKnight said. His "Road to Appomattox," for instance, is about the diary of a Civil War soldier, leading to the belief that "if we are going to war, let's really be cognizant of the consequences." McKnight doesn't shy away from topics that can be polarizing but is thoughtful about his presentation. "Irish blood tends to make me pro-something rather than anti-something (but) I have a sense of how to communicate to a wider array of the ways people think. For me, what focuses people is the story. As a songwriter I try hard to start a movie rolling in your head in the first few lines of a song … What the characters experience is really the message. "I prefer that approach to more typical folksingers simply protesting. There's a place for that but I tend toward being the musical cinematographer. It's safer to step into the movie and be more open to see what I want to show them without feeling threatened."

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