*** Sweaty Betty Blues Band *** Please refer to our myspace site for our complete schedule - www.sweatybettybluesband.com

Ambridge's Kaunert tackles the blues away

Bill Utterback

 Times Sports Staff

A college football game rages inside a television perched above a corner of the impromptu stage in Kelly's Riverside Saloon. A Pittsburgh Penguins post-game show slumbers soundlessly in a television above the opposite corner.

In between the televisions, the glowing red bulbs of a video game leave the bar's patrons looking slightly overheated.

Saturday night lights.

The team huddles at the video machine to discuss its playlist before the musicians assemble in a shotgun formation, the drummer taking his position behind the line of guitarists. The tight end from Ambridge, naturally, takes his place at the end of the line.

Marcy Brown, the quarterback of the Sweaty Betty Blues Band, establishes her Pro Bowl credentials with a reverberating vocal interpretation of "The Worst Kinda Man," then turns to her left and says, "Matt, it's time to play some blues."

Matt Kaunert, 17-year-old co-captain of the 2006 Ambridge football team, seizes the moment, squeezes the music in his hands and shapes the evening with passion and imagination.

The Bridger is a bluesman.

On Friday, Kaunert blocked a punt in a victory over Moon Area.

On Saturday, Kaunert rocked the Bridgewater bar with his electric guitar.

"This was one of the most exciting weekends of the year," Kaunert said after Monday's practice.

On Sunday, Kaunert and his parents, Dave and Aggie Kaunert of Economy, retreated to the family's place in Tidioute, along the Allegheny River. Matt Kaunert spends his time there exploring the river, looking for snakes, snapping turtles and hellbenders (oversized salamanders). He collects the creatures with his hands, studies them, photographs and videotapes them, and then returns them unharmed.

"I've been doing that longer than I've done anything else," he said. "I have hundreds of photographs, and hours of videotape."

If the producers of Friday Night Lights were looking for an intriguing figure upon which to base one of their television characters, Kaunert wouldn't fit. Who would believe the captain of the football team is a blues guitar prodigy who catches wild animals with his bare hands? And, he's an honor student with a 3.8 grade-point average.

Kaunert's senior season is both dynamic and demanding.

After a Friday victory over Uniontown, Kaunert joined the band for a street festival Saturday in Carnegie. After a loss to Hopewell, Kaunert joined the band for a performance Saturday evening in Erie, and in a music festival Sunday in Indiana, Pa.

After catching a touchdown pass against West Allegheny, Kaunert caught up with the band at a club Saturday in the South Hills. After recording a safety in a victory over New Castle, he joined the band Saturday in a blues festival/fundraiser at Moondog's in Blawnox.

"It's tough on my parents because they've got to take me everywhere," Kaunert said. "I couldn't have done any of this without their help and support."

Kaunert developed a passion for the guitar when, as a child, he found his father's "ugly orange" guitar under a bed. Dave Kaunert never played professionally, but Matt was joining veteran musicians at walk-in jam sessions at bars when he was 10 and 11.

"I got thrown out of a few bars," he said. "They said I was too young, but I learned so much being around the musicians at jam sessions."

By the time he got to high school, he was playing in a band (Diversity) with some classmates. They got some club work and experimented with blues, jazz and rock.

When the band dissolved, Kaunert returned to the jam sessions, including a workout at a club in Chippewa Township where he met and played with Marcy Brown and her husband/drummer, Bill Brown. A conversation began and Kaunert soon joined the Sweaty Betty Blues Band.

Marcy Brown has been singing professionally for more than 15 years, and Bill Brown has been drumming with bands for 30 years. Guitarist George Kalantzis played professionally in Chicago, with bands that opened for the Eagles and 10,000 Maniacs, among others.

Guitarist Duane Davis, who was Kaunert's teacher, has spent more than 20 years contributing to bands in the Pittsburgh area.

The veteran musicians had no trouble accepting the precocious rookie.

"I've learned so much from all of them, and they've always accepted me and valued my opinion," Kaunert said.

The band's website describes Kaunert in glowing terms: "Steeped in the solid blues traditions of B.B. King, Freddie King and other blues greats, Matt is creating his own unique style."

Kaunert, at Kelly's, took a long, powerful solo inside B.B. Kings "Thrill is Gone," and then joined Kalantzis in an electric guitar conversation inside John Lee Hooker's "Dimples."

"A lot of it is ad-lib, you just play what's inside you ... you play what you feel."

The band will record for the first time, perhaps in November, and release its first recording next year.

Beyond his senior season, Kaunert admits to feeling a little uncertain. His future is unresolved. He will attend college, perhaps to study environmental science. He wants to play football, and thinks about staying with the band.

"Wherever I go, I see myself playing the guitar."

A bluesman belongs beneath the Saturday night lights.

Beaver County Times Allegheny Times 2006

`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````

  View more photos by our friend, Ralf, the jitterbuggin' shutterbug at:

http://www.pbase.com/ralf/sweaty_betty

 In Memory of Jake   - Pittsburgh's 'Prime Minister of the Blues'