by Tom Keyser, features reporter
[excerpt]
Popular music
Chandler Travis is celebrating his birthday this week, and he wants you at the party — one or all of them. Travis, who plays a twisted, over-the-top mix of irreverent Dixieland, pop and jazz — and pretty much anything else he tosses into the soup — with his horn-heavy Travis Chandler Philharmonic, is making a three-day swing through the area that will land him in Chatham on Friday and Saratoga Springs on Saturday. For his first two shows — at Chatham’s Peint O’Gwrw Tafarn and Saratoga’s Caffe Lena — Travis will perform with the Chandler Travis Philharmonette, the slightly smaller version of his weird, wild, nine-piece Philharmonic. The Philharmonic will join Travis for a Sunday night show at the Iron Horse in Northampton, Mass. Travis has dubbed the gigs “Channy & Rikki’s Birthday Tour,” because the show dates fall near his birthday and that of the band’s drummer, Rikki Bates. That the shows are a few days before St. Patrick’s Day hasn’t escaped Travis, who said fans will have to show up to see if he and the Philharmonette play a few songs from the band’s “Raw Blarney” album. 8 p.m. Friday. Free. Peint O’Gwrw, 36 Main St., Chatham. 392-2337. 8 p.m. Saturday. $20. Caffe Lena, 47 Phila St., Saratoga Springs. 583-0022; http://www.caffelena.org