What do you think of when somebody says Old Lyme? A classic New England town? Likely. The tick bite heard 'round the world? Perhaps. A sophisticated jazz club? Are you kidding?

All kidding aside, Old Lyme is home to The Side Door, a new jazz club at the Old Lyme Inn that's bringing some of the hottest names in jazz to the shoreline, including pianist Bill Charlap, saxophonist Jimmy Greene, and vocalist Giacomo Gates.

On a recent evening Greene, a prolific performer who won a State of Connecticut Governor's Arts Award this year, and his quartet played to a packed house. The audience included everybody from collegeaged students in Greene's jazz program at Western Connecticut State University to 92-year-old Helen Flis from New Britain, a part of a three-generation family of daughters, sons-in-law, and a granddaughter, many of them school music teachers.

"I like music. I like concerts. They usually take me along," said Flis, nodding to her family. At the end of Greene's sold-out performance, Flis was glad she had come.

"I really enjoyed it. It's so nice to see all the young people," she said. Keenan and Ryan Asbridge from Hebron, college students, had come to hear their professor, Jimmy Greene, play.

"I'm surprised to find this place, but I'm glad it's here," Ryan Asbridge said.

Jazz aficionado Dave Johnson, who has his own website, www.jazzhaven.org, which lists upcoming performances in the greater New Haven area, had one word for Greene's performance: "Awesome."

Greene's set included "Ana's Way," a number written in tribute to his daughter, Ana Márquez-Greene, one of the 1st graders killed in the shooting last December at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.

"It's been a nightmarish year," Greene, a Bloomfield native, told the audience, while thanking them for the expressions of support and condolence his family has received.

The Side Door is the creation of Ken Kitchings. He bought the Old Lyme Inn in 2011 with his wife, Christine, who also owns The Bowerbird, a longtime upscale gift shop in Old Lyme.

"There used to be an Italian restaurant attached to the inn in this space," Kitchings said of the area where The Side Door is located.

He revamped the room with acoustic baffles on the walls and ceiling and cork tiles on the floors to minimize the sound of footsteps.

Lynn Costa-Klein, who had come down from Hartford with her husband, Gary Klein, to hear Giacomo Gates, recalled Bill Charlap's performance, which she had also attended. The bartender had stepped outside to put ice in the drinks so the clink would not disrupt the act.

"The acoustics are wonderful," Costa-Klein said. "It is unbelievable how much thought has gone into this place. We love the room and we are trying to spread the word."

Engineer Nick Sexton, at the audio booth in the back of the club, said his goal was to make the sound as intimate as possible. Intimate, in fact, is the world to describe the whole club, which has a maximum seating capacity of 80 people.

"It's very personal, not like hearing jazz in a big hall," said Anthony Womsey, the piano player in Greene's quartet.

Giacomo Gates felt the same way after finishing the first of his two sets.

"This is the way jazz should be heard," he said.

Kitchings, who said he would play his drum set to any kind of music he heard as a teenager, can't remember when he didn't love jazz, and he's not the first in his family to feel that way. As a young man, his father, the late Chester W. Kitchings, Sr., ran away to join the Eddie Duchin band at the Chicago World's Fair of l933-'34. Drumming didn't prove to be a career; Kitchings and his family owned the Coca-Cola bottling franchise in New London for more than 70 years.

After the family sold the business, Ken Kitchings teamed up with Steven Sigal of the Garde Arts Center in New London to produce jazz at the Oasis, a room upstairs at the Garde, before he decided to open a jazz facility of his own.

Eighty-six-year-old jazz legend George Wein, founder of the Newport Jazz Festival, opened The Side Door with a group called the Newport All-Stars in May. Kitchings said getting fi rstrate performers to Old Lyme is not the challenge it might seem, pointing out the club is two hours from both New York and Boston, making it accessible to both.

"These musicians need places to play; they can come here, do a show, and be home at two in the morning," Kitchings said. "Bill Charlap can do a few dates at Carnegie Hall, but where is he going to play all those other nights?"

Kitchings said he has begun to receive calls from musicians and their agents about appearing. Club manager Jan Mullen pointed out that Kitchings's vast knowledge of the contemporary jazz scene was an enormous asset in booking artists.

"Ken has a great passion for jazz; he loves it completely and utterly," she said.

With sounds from acid rock and afro-punk to heavy metal and psychedelic grunge filling ear buds and iPods, there is always somebody proclaiming jazz is dying, or worse yet, dead. But that is not something Kitchings sees.

"Jazz is never going to go away; it just needs a place to breathe," he said.

"Places to hear jazz diminish. This place is going to be a mecca," said Cynthia Morrill, who had come from New Haven to hear Jimmy Greene.

Kitchings wants the club to appeal to existing jazz fans, create more fans, and present a viable option for people who simply want a good night out.

"You can go hear Jimmy Buffet for $100 watching a giant television screen, but here you are three feet from the piano player," he said. "I am trying to promote world-class music, to have people say, 'Oh my gosh, I don't have to go to New York City.''' So far, so good.

"This place is a treasure," said former Old Lyme first selectman Tim Griswold, seated with friends at a table listening to Gates.

On a recent evening, Pamela and Bud Klimas were at The Side Door celebrating Bud's birthday. They read about the club and decided to give it a try.

"It's nice. It's different; there's not a lot of live entertainment around here. I think this place is going to make it," Bud Klimas said.

Pamela Klimas admitted that at first Old Lyme might seem an unusual location for a jazz club, but added, "You know, the times change."

For Mike Song and his wife, Kristin, their evening was a return to the Old Lyme Inn. They had gotten married there nearly 20 years ago and were now celebrating their anniversary at The Side Door.

"I was shocked when I walked in and saw all the people," Mike admitted. Jerry and Joyce Fink from South Windsor were marking their 34th anniversary at the club, on a package the Old Lyme Inn calls All That Jazz, which combines a night stay at the inn with dinner, tickets to The Side Door, and a complimentary glass of wine or beer. (The Bee and Thistle Inn, also in Old Lyme, is now offering a two-night package that includes tickets to The Side Door.)

The club has already hosted, among others, Australian singer and bass player Nicki Parrott, Grammy-nominated Fred Hersch and international vocal competition-winner Cyrille Aimee with jazz guitarist Diego Figueiredo. Tickets range from the mid-$20s to around $40 for an evening, which includes two jazz sets. The club has a full bar and serves an assortment of finger food.

"Every show is different," Kitchings said.

And unpredictable. When Hamden-born pianist Luciano Salvatore appeared, his son Sergio, also a musician, came up from the audience and the two jammed together on a selection called "Back to Face."

"Where else could you hear something like that?" Kitchings asked.

At the beginning of recent shows, Kitchings bounded onstage to introduce the evening's act and preview upcoming performances. His enthusiasm for the job at hand seemed boundless.

"Can you believe the guys who are coming? It is unbelievable," he said, answering his own question.

After the introduction, Kitchings worked the room, greeting patrons, shaking hands with those he knew and those he didn't. The smile never left his face.

"I'm just like a kid in a candy store," he said. "Every day is Christmas for me in here."

And he's clearly not the only one enjoying himself. The writer's husband, who remembered jazz clubs of another era, walked up to Giacomo Gates after the singer fi nished. He had something he really wanted to say: "You made me feel young again," he told Gates.

The Side Door Jazz Club at the Old Lyme Inn is at 85 Lyme Street. Contact 860-434-0886 or janm.thesidedoor@gmail.com For a complete schedule of upcoming events and directions to the Old Lyme Inn, visit www.thesidedoorjazz.com.