The Bayou
| Address | 3135 K Street, Georgetown, Washington, D.C., U.S. |
|---|---|
| Location | Georgetown, Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Capacity | 900 |
| Opened | September 1953 |
| Closed | 1999 |
The Bayou was a music venue and nightclub located in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. The club occupied an old building at 3135 K Street, NW, in Georgetown, under the Whitehurst Freeway for forty-six years. The club opened in September 1953 on the site of a former Dixieland nightclub called The Pirates Den which featured Dixieland jazz until the early 1960s when the format changed to rock and roll. Performers included Count Basie and Woody Herman.
The club included a balcony level, with tables and chairs, and two standing room only bars. The main floor bars were fed bottled liquor from a tap room that was situated above the entrance. Bottles placed upside down into funnels feeding long tubing led to the downstairs bars. The Bayou backed up to Blues Alley, another Washington, D.C.-based music institution, located down the alley behind the Bayou.