Dish

Music to Our Ears

Good food is easy to find around Washington. So is live music. Finding the two together, playing in perfect harmony, is another matter.

Brennan Reilly hopes to fix that problem Oct. 18, when the corporate lawyer plans to open the Carlyle Club (411 John Carlyle St., Alexandria; 703-549-8957), an art deco-style restaurant that will serve up live piano music at lunch and piano, jazz trios or big-band performances by night. Reilly says the project, five years in the planning, is his attempt to revive the good old days of the Stork Club and El Morocco, fabled New York supper clubs, while filling a gap in the local scene.

The Carlyle Club is not a maiden voyage for Reilly, who owns a diner, Yesterdays All-American Cafe, in Rehoboth Beach, Del., and co-owns the historic Gadsby's Tavern in Old Town Alexandria. But his latest spot, which he co-owns with his wife, Sharon, is certainly his biggest: more than 200 seats and 8,000 square feet of dining room, bar and dance floor. Custom-designed carpet from England, banquettes swathed in black leather and big-name musicians -- the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra is scheduled for Oct. 20 and 21 -- are part of the lure. Reilly says music fans who follow the moves of Dorsey, the Glenn Miller Orchestra, the Rat Pack Tribute Show and other headliners online have already contacted the future restaurant (http://www.thecarlyleclub.com) from as far away as Ontario and Tokyo.

At the stove: Great Falls native James Bryant, 40, who comes to the restaurant from the Dataw Island Club in Saint Helena, S.C. The chef's score, a mix of yesterday and today, will run from oysters Rockefeller and duck confit salad to jumbo lump crab cakes and venison loin with goat cheese risotto.

-- Tom Sietsema