I’ve known Chris Ohlman for more than 40 years, but unfortunately have only seen her perform a handful of times. And some of those were when we were on the same bill in different groups at charity events.

I caught The Beehive Queen and her remarkable band Rebel Montez Saturday night at Cafe Nine, a tiny club that might hold 200, in New Haven, Connecticut. Chris showed why she is one of the state’s legendary R&B/soul singers as I watched her play the first of two 90-minute sets that included original tunes from each of her five albums and a number of meticulously chosen covers that not only put her vast talents on full display but also carried a sense of blues and soul history.

One of the first groups Chris sang with in the late ’60s was called Fancy, which included her brother Vic Steffens and was based out of Wallingford, CT at Syncron Studios, later Trod Nossel, managed by Doc Cavalier.  In the ’70s, she fronted the ultra popular and ultra hot regional act The Scratch Band, which also featured G.E. Smith, later a leader of the Saturday Night Live Band, and bassist Paul Ossola, also with SNL. Chris as well has been a singer with the SNL Band since the early ’90s.

In the past decade or so, she’s led Rebel Montez, a staple on the Northeast club circuit, as well as having performed with a multitude of outstanding American and British musicians in various bands and at special events, including the Bob Dylan 39th Anniversary Tribute Concert.

She opened Saturday with the Otis Redding adaptation of That’s How Strong My Love Is, one of many inspired cover choices. Chris’ voice has a natural raspiness she can call on when she wants to put a hard edge in her vocal stylings but it also drips like honey on ballads and moderate tempo tunes. Her range is prodigious and few singers project the emotional depth she injects into her songs.

The band’s second song was the title track from her upcoming album The Deep End, a soulful, moderate tempo tune with a flowing melody and memorable chorus. Other originals, which included Another Country, A Shot Of You and The Seventh Sons, among many others, came from the albums The Hard Way, Radio Queen, Wicked Time, Strip and her career retrospective Re-Hive. She said The Deep End, which is now being mastered and features an amazing cast of guests including Al Anderson, Ian Hunter, Dion Dimucci, Levon Helm, Marshall Crenshaw, G.E. Smith, Eric Ambel and Andy York, should be released in about two months.

Chris also loves to impart a little history in her raps between songs and she pointed out that Irma Franklin, Aretha’s sister, was the first to record Piece Of My Heart, which Janice Joplin popularized. Chris then gave her take based more on the Franklin version and it came across just beautifully with soulful restraint compared with the Joplin rendition but a deep groove and feel that is tough to match.

Toward the end  of the set, the band pulled out a raucous, rollicking version of Buddy Holly’s Not Fade Away that shook the the small club and elicited whoops and hollers from the appreciative crowd.

Her band is a tight, proficient unit that includes guitar player extraordinaire Cliff Goodwin, bassist Michael Colbath and drummer Larry Donahue. Goodwin is featured on many of the tunes with solos that span from understated soul picking to ripping slide on Hounddog Taylor’s Give Me Back My Wig. The tight and rocking rhythm section of Colbath and Donahue holds steady with creative bursts that range from tasteful to incendiary.

In all, Rebel Montez is a tough act to match, especially in a club like Cafe Nine, which is one of the few in the area that features live music seven nights a week. They’re playing almost non-stop this summer, many dates in the Northeast, including a date at the Infinity Music Hall in Norfolk, Connecticut in August. If you’re a fan of the blues and soul, you owe it to yourself to check out Chris and her band. You won’t regret it.