Cleary is the outlier in this group, an artist in his prime with a recent Grammy and presumably the opportunity to record for the major label of his choice. It’s interesting that he agreed to be part of this collection because he certainly won’t sell as many albums in this format as he would as a stand-alone album with big league distribution. I suspect he was honored to be included in the lineup, being a lifelong fan of New Orleans music who came to New Orleans as an adult to learn how to play it and has mastered the idiom from the inside out. On So Swell Cleary is joined by drummer Johnny Vidacovich, bassist James Singleton and saxophonist James Rivers. Of the four albums in the collection, this is the most raucous, a true celebration of the party spirit of New Orleans music.

Cleary shows his total assimilation of the New Orleans tradition, rolling out the pianistic barrel on the Stephen Foster Rosetta Stone of “Swanee River Boogie,” following with his own R&B shuffle “Two Wrongs,” then charging on into Stevie Wonder’s “I Call It Pretty Music,” everything played the way he learned it listening to James Booker at the Maple Leaf. He goes on to demonstrate his mastery of the triplet form on the Lloyd Price cornerstone, “Just Because,” then on into Booker’s strutting, rolling “So Swell When You’re Well” and Chuck Carbo’s great story of the celebration following a beloved bartender’s death, “Second Line on Monday.”

Side two opens with the Johnny Guitar Watson instrumental “Make No Exception” and the melancholy “I Get the Blues When It Rains.” Vidacovich kicks the party back into gear with the second line drum rhythm of Lee Dorsey’s “Lottie Mo.” Cleary shows his knowledge of musical history by translating the Allman Brothers tune “Pony Boy” back through its Louisiana roots, evoking the classic “Mess Around.” Then it’s on to a raucous take on Huey “Piano” Smith’s “Tuberculucas and the Sinus Blues,” a wacky follow-up to “Rockin’ Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu” and a great dance between Cleary, Vidacovich and Singleton. Cleary shows another side of his talents with a beautifully rendered vocal on the Skyliners’ 1958 hit “Since I Don’t Have You,” featuring a great exchange with Rivers.