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I got a pretty powerful glimpse at the future of old Henry Street on Saturday night.

OK. Officially, it's First Street. But it used to be Henry Street, and it was jumping. Audiences could go there to hear the greats in jazz and soul music -- such acts as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, James Brown, Otis Redding, Fats Domino, Cab Calloway.

Then desegregation came. Then urban renewal came. Then Henry Street became a ghost.

A new festival hit Henry on Saturday. The inaugural Blue Ridge Blues and BBQ Festival looked like a success. Something else looked just as good -- the potential for the buildings on either side of the street.

One of them is close to complete. Renovation is nearly finished at Hotel Dumas, where a lot of the old-school musicians used to stay. Total Action Against Poverty purchased the 89-year-old building and will rename it the Dumas Center for Artistic and Cultural Development.

Downtown Music Lab's Charlie Hamill, whose group will occupy the top floor, gave me a tour Saturday. A 200-seat theater is taking shape, with plenty of room backstage for actors and musicians. Upstairs, the music lab kids will have four studios and plenty of performance and learning space.

Across the street at the old Ebony Club and the busted-down buildings next door, things still look bleak -- but on paper, that's going to change. A culinary institute is planned there, courtesy of Roanoke Higher Education Center and the Claude Moore Foundation. Virginia Intermont College, in Bristol, will run the school. Classes are scheduled to begin about spring 2007.

On the street, things were looking pretty good, too. The Blue Ridge Blues Society isn't close to a year old, but it already planned and pulled off a pretty sweet festival. Music on two stages was practically nonstop, save for a couple of times when the rain fell. The organizers scheduled a good mix of electric and acoustic blues from local, regional and national acts.

But the best part of the festival happened near the end of the night, when acoustic blues and jazz man Nat Reese was onstage. Reese, 82, was born in Salem, and though he moved away when he was young, he retains ties to the region and plays here sometimes.

Before Reese left the stage, the blues society's Kerry Hurley presented Reese with a lifetime achievement award, drawing big applause from an audience that Reese had just captivated with his music.

Afterward, Reese volunteered that the award was a huge surprise. "I looked up, wondering if hail was going to fall," Reese said.

He kept talking about moving back to Roanoke. I'd like to imagine him hanging out at the Downtown Music Lab, doing what he loves -- teaching children to play music.