BY LARRY NAGER
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Emily Barnes never met Michael Bany, but because of him, the 18-year-old college freshman at the Cleveland Institute of Music can spend more time practicing her violin and less time sorting mail.

If you go What: Second Annual Cammy Awards. When: 5 p.m. March 15. Where: Sycamore Gardens, 1133 Sycamore St., Over-the-Rhine. Tickets: $10 (plus service charges) at Ticketmaster outlets. Ticket sales benefit the Michael W. Bany Scholarship Fund. Performing: the psychodots, 1997 favorite band Cammy winners reunite; all-star blues jam with the Blue Birds, Larry and Tim Goshorn, Kelly Richey, Wheels' Jeff Seeman and special appearance by Noah Hunt; Mike Reid, Grammy-winning singer - songwriter in a rare solo performance; Blessid Union of Souls unplugged; Over The Rhine, with 1997 rock vocal Cammy winner Karin Bergquist; Roundhead, the 1997 Cammy-winning alternative band; Stagger Lee, 1997 Cammy-winning country band; Latin X-Posure - 12-piece salsa - jazz band. Michael Flannery of WCPO-TV will host the show.

Suzanne Buerkle, 20, also has Mr. Bany to thank as she pursues her dream of someday playing flute in the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. The sophomore at Indiana University is the other recipient of the Michael W. Bany Memorial Scholarship, named for the self-taught Cincinnati musician who spent the majority of his 42 years playing in local bars.

When the singer - bassist was killed Dec. 29, 1995 during a robbery after an Over-the-Rhine performance, his younger brother Mark and a group of Mr. Bany's friends and fellow musicians refused to let that be the end of the story.

''It started at the funeral home after Michael's death. Everybody there, all the musicians, wanted to do something, something more than flowers,'' recalls Mickey Foellger, who in the '70s and early '80s was manager and drummer for Wheels, Mr. Bany's best-known band.

Started with jam

They founded the Michael W. Bany Memorial Scholarship Fund to further music education in Greater Cincinnati, says Mr. Foellger, a Campbell County District Judge. To make some sense of Mr. Bany's death, they chose to create something positive, something to enable other musicians to make the most of their talents.

''We'd hate to see somebody not get the chance to see how good they are because they didn't get the chance to go to college and study music,'' Mr. Foellger says.

The scholarship is one of more than 75 administered by the Cincinnati Scholarship Foundation. Of those, only about a half-dozen are memorial funds, says CSF president Ned Hertzenberg.

''It's a nice way to continue the memory of someone,'' he says. ''When someone receives a scholarship like that they ask, 'Who was Michael Bany?' ''

Along with the money raised by the memorial concert, the Bany scholarship is funded by an annual golf outing, occasional reunion concerts by the surviving members of Wheels, private donations and what has become the fund's largest annual fund-raiser, the Enquirer Cincinnati Area Pop Music Awards (the Cammys).

The fund stands at a little more than $64,000; the goal is to raise that to $100,000 and fund the scholarships from income earned through investments.

A minimum goal is to assist four music students each year. The scholarship follows each student through four years of college, providing a grade average of 2.5 is maintained for the freshman year and 2.75 for the remainder of college.

More than a scholarship

''We do a lot more than just write a check and send it off to the school,'' Mr. Hertzenberg says. ''They have to write a 'Thank you' letter, and we get their grades every quarter. If they're having a problem with a course, we fix them up with tutors. A lot of them we help to find jobs in the summer.''

In return, the CSF receives a 10 percent administrative fee based on money distributed. Last year, those fees came to $175 for the Bany scholarship. The Bany scholarship is unusual in its specific musical focus, Mr. Hertzenberg says.

''Financially, it's really helped,'' says Ms. Barnes, who faces more than $20,000 in yearly college expenses. She has applied for a variety of additional grants and scholarships. She receives $750 per year (grant amounts are based on need).

She has raised additional money for her studies by playing her violin on Cincinnati streets, as well as in more typical part-time jobs, such as a work-study program in her school mail room.

Her father, Steve, is also a musician, having played guitar in bands on BB Riverboats. He met Mr. Bany and had seen him with the Goshorn Brothers Band and Wheels. Mr. Barnes knows firsthand what a struggle it can be to make a living as a musician.

His daughter is off to a good start. She earned straight A's in her first semester and says the fund made it possible.

''Having the Bany scholarship helps me work not so many hours,'' she says. ''I can devote more time to practicing and study.''

Constant motivator

''I was very honored to get this and it motivates me to keep my grades up,'' she says. ''I'm sort of representing a cause.''

For Mark Bany, it's a way to keep Michael's memory alive.

''Without this scholarship, what would we have left? We could listen to some tapes or look at some pictures,'' Mark says. ''. . . We can't bring him back, but we're going to help other people. He would have wanted this.''

Contributions can be made to the Michael W. Bany Scholarship Fund through the Cincinnati Scholarship Fund, 652 Main St., Cincinnati 45202 (345-6701).