Rolling Stones hint at 50th anniversary shows

Rock veterans The Rolling Stones spent the night together as they celebrated half a century since their first gig.

The band, sporting a few more wrinkles than on their debut exactly 50 years ago, embraced and partied as they marked their milestone.

Sir Mick Jagger, Ronnie Wood, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts came together in public for the first time for four years as they launched a photo exhibition chronicling the band's career.

The quartet last got together when they attended the premiere of Martin Scorsese's documentary Shine A Light in 2008.

The smartly-dressed stars - with Wood wearing studded loafers - gathered at Somerset House in central London tonight, along with family, friends and those who had helped them along the way.

Guests included Sir Mick's girlfriend, L'Wren Scott, as well as his daughters Georgia and Lizzy, while other Stones offspring in attendance included Wood's daughter Leah.

Friends such as Sir Tim Rice, Mick Hucknall and the novelist Ian Rankin were among those at the reception to mark the exhibition of archive photos, which opens tomorrow.

It also saw the group reunited with former members Bill Wyman - who quit the band two decades ago - and Mick Taylor, who left in the 1970s.

Today was the anniversary of the band's first show at the Marquee club in London's Oxford Street on 1962, when they played as The Rollin' Stones, hastily chosen from a song by their blues hero, Muddy Waters.

The group - whose hits include Let's Spend The Night Together - landed the gig when the venue's regular band, Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated, were booked for a BBC radio show and Marquee owner Harold Pendleton booked them to fill in.

Earlier today, the band prompted speculation that, despite the core four members' combined age of 272, they may play once more.

Richards told the BBC they had met up for "a couple of rehearsals". He added: "There's things in the works, there's nothing so final that I could say."

The exhibition - featuring archive black and white shots of the group from the 1960s - is on until August 27 and the Stones are celebrating the anniversary with the release of an official book, Rolling Stones 50.

A new Rolling Stones documentary will be released in November.