Photos by CHRISTINA O'CONNOR Special to The Roanoke Times

The Wading Girl lead singer and guitarist Billy Wallace belts out folksy rock tunes with the rest of his band (Sarah Garrison and Josh Eernisse, not pictured) during the opening night of the Late Night Stage series at Gillie's in Blacksburg.

Photos by CHRISTINA O'CONNOR Special to The Roanoke Times

The Wading Girl lead singer and guitarist Billy Wallace belts out folksy rock tunes with the rest of his band (Sarah Garrison and Josh Eernisse, not pictured) during the opening night of the Late Night Stage series at Gillie's in Blacksburg.

CHRISTINA O'CONNOR Special to The Roanoke Times

Roanoke band The Wading Girl performs during the opening night of the Late Night Stage series at Gillie's restaurant in Blacksburg.

BLACKSBURG -- A longtime breakfast and veggie favorite, Gillie's Vegetarian Restaurant has something new on the menu: music.

The downtown restaurant kicked off its new music series, Late Night Stage at Gillie's on Friday with a party and performance by Roanoke's The Wading Girl and a performance by the jazz group Olivarez Trio on Saturday.

The idea for Late Night Stage started when Anita Lackey, a Gillie's server, mentioned to a co-worker that her dream job would be booking bands for a music venue, and the restaurant's owners had been trying to attract an older crowd.

Restaurant owner Renae Gillie "wanted to provide a more adult atmosphere," said Lackey, who now coordinates the Late Night Stage concerts. "This gives people a good reason to come out and relax."

Lackey said she doesn't feel that the concerts at Gillie's are in direct competition with the bar scene in downtown Blacksburg, or even other music venues, but just another place for people to enjoy music.

"It's a downtown scene for a different crowd" from college students, said Sarah Solari, server and bartender at Gillie's. "It's an untapped market."

Lackey originally planned to bring in local bands, but decided to try to book a mix of local and nonlocal bands to make Gillie's concerts different.

"You have to travel pretty far to see some bands," Solari said. "That's a long night if you have kids, and you have to be home in time for the sitter -- there aren't that many opportunities available right here."

But there will be local musicians booked, because there is a lot of talent locally, Lackey said.

Lackey, who lived in Hickory, N.C., before moving to Blacksburg last year, said she has met people who see a lot of potential in the Blacksburg music scene but don't know where to go or when.

"We want to be the venue that people from Roanoke or Floyd heard about," Lackey said. "I've heard that Blacksburg used to be the spot to hear music 15 years ago, and we want that back. We want to support music in general."

One aspect that has been popular so far is that the concerts are nonsmoking, Lackey said.

"It was kind of a funny response, because even with smokers, they were telling us that they were really enjoying that it's nonsmoking," Lackey said. "You just don't have to breathe in other people's smoke."

Solari said that in talking with people Friday and Saturday, she felt that a concert series such as Late Night Stage at Gillie's was something Blacksburg needed, but didn't know it.

"Gillie's is an institution here, but it's time to get the word out that Gillie's is more than breakfast and vegetarian," Lackey said. "To be around this long, since 1974, you have to evolve, and this is just another facet of that."