Photo / Sheila Lennon (Click it to see it larger.)

Providence-born jazz saxophonist Scott Hamilton returned from his home in Europe for a reunion of the Hamilton-Bates Blue Flames Saturday night at Local 121. Original bassist Preston Hubbard was in St. Louis and booked for another gig, so he couldn't make it, but his parents did. From left, Dave Zinno on bass, drummer Chuck Riggs, Hamilton on sax, and Fred Bates on guitar.

Here's about 12 seconds of ambient sound as they played, just a taste. (mp3)

(My camera card was full of photos of my garden. After I recorded this -- as video too dark to see, so I just ripped the audio track -- I noticed I only had room for just one more photo. Not wanting to be a jerk, I hadn't used a flash, and I could see there just wasn't enough light in what I'd shot. On the last chance, I used a flash, just once. That's the result above.)

Great to hear the sages bring it together and take us with them. Working it out and easy moments, always subtle and genuinely transporting at times, especially on their touchstone tune from the old days, Honky Tonk.

Local 121 owner Josh Miller introduced them as a band he first hired 32 years ago, to play at the old Met Cafe (which he owned with Tom Bates), where I first saw the Blue Flames. My husband knew them from gigs at the Black Elks Club off Broad Street, which served up fine music and sandwiches of ribs or a whole chicken breast, with bones, between two slices of white bread.

Different times. The intimate basement in the old Dreyfus could be Providence's version of the RegattaBar at the Charles Hotel in Cambridge, holding five dozen or so at tables and standing at the bar. It's a nice room for sublime sounds.

The $20 cover was worth it, but $9.50 for a glass of dry house-red wine puts it more in conventioneers' range than mine. But this night was special, so we aren't counting.