Rob Litowitz is an intellectual property lawyer in Washington who's been hosting nationally known musicians in his living room for more than four years — a performance series he's dubbed "Live at Roxy's" (Roxy is the family dog). "It was all made possible by the wonders of the Internet," he says. "I'm a big music fan and came across something on a music discussion board talking about a 'house concert' in California, and I had no idea what they were talking about. I put 'house concert' into a search engine and found this amazing world where people around the country were having concerts in their homes, which was a totally foreign concept to me at the time."

One day later, Litowitz heard an interview with singer Ana Egge on his car radio, "and I put two and two together," he says. "I'd never heard of her before, but she was good, and I used to book acts into the coffeehouse at college, so I thought, 'I'll book a show, and it will happen to be at my house.' " He wrote a letter to Egge's manager, and after a few e-mails and phone calls, there she was in Litowitz's living room in Bethesda, playing in front of 70 people.

"It was a Thursday night, and she was on tour and was in between someplace and someplace, and it made sense to do it," Litowitz says. He invited his friends and friends of friends he thought would enjoy Egge, asked for $15 at the door, put out some wine and cheese and played the happy host. "She made a fortune," he says proudly. "And we had a great concert."

There are about a dozen people in the Washington area who regularly present house concerts, and the home I've strolled into without knocking belongs to Beth Auerbach and Norman Stewart. They host mostly local and regional folk performers, bringing them in every three months or so. They call their concert series the "Sleepy Hollow Folk Club." The night I'm there, those 50 folding chairs are arranged to face Charlottesville songwriter/guitarist Terri Allard, joined by her frequent musical sidekick, Gary Green, on harmonica.

The duo plays for about 40 minutes, then takes a break. Allard walks up to the kitchen ready to do commerce. With a warm smile on her face and a kind word for every fan, she sells disc after disc, inscribing them all, often with something personal learned while conversing with the buyer. They all sign her e-mail list for future gig announcements and walk away happy, pouring themselves another beer, soda or glass of wine before the second set begins.