Doctors, Professors, Kings and Queens: The Big Ol' Box of New Orleans

Disc 1
1	Welcome to New Orleans / Theryl DeClouet 0:15
2	Drop Me Off in New Orleans / Kermit Ruffins 4:28
3	I'm Walkin' / Fats Domino 2:07
4	Iko Iko / Dr. John 4:08
5	Potato Head Blues / Louis Armstrong & His Hot Seven 2:54
6	My Darlin' New Orleans / Percolators 4:01
7	Para Donde Vas (Where Are You Going) / The Iguanas 3:17
8	Meet the Boyz on the Battlefront / Big Chief Monk Boudreaux 4:36
9	Ain't Got No Home / Clarence "Frogman" Henry 2:19
10	Feel Like Funkin' It Up / Rebirth Brass Band 5:05
11	Zydeco Gris-Gris / Beausoleil 3:38
12	Mother-In-Law / Ernie K-Doe 2:32
13	That's Enough of That Stuff / Marcia Ball 4:30
14	Confidential / The Radiators 4:11
15	Hey Pocky A-Way / The Meters 4:03
16	I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say / Jelly Roll Morton 3:13
17	Foot of Canal Street / Paul Sanchez 3:48
18	Down in Honky Tonk Town / Vernel Bagneris Live 3:01
19	Rocking Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu / The Clowns 2:17
20	More Hipper / Jon Cleary & the Absolute Monster Gentlemen 5:28
21	Release Me / Johnny Adams 2:51
22	Preachin' Blues / Sidney Bechet & His New Orleans Feetwarmers 3:13
23	Jambalaya (On the Bayou) / Clifton Chenier Live 3:35
Disc 2
1	Dog Days / Leigh Harris 5:49
2	No City Like New Orleans / Earl King 4:33
3	Salée Dames, Bon Jour / Creole Serenaders 2:48
4	Marshall's Club / Balfa Toujours 3:42
5	You Can Have My Husband / Irma Thomas Live 3:13
6	Go Go / Galactic 3:04
7	Not Too Eggy / New Orleans Klezmer All Stars 2:11
8	St. James Infirmary / Preservation Hall Jazz Band 5:37
9	Going Back to New Orleans / Deacon John Moore 2:45
10	Hot Tamale Baby / Buckwheat Zydeco 4:08
11	Fear, Hate, Envy, Jealousy / Neville Brothers Live 4:25
12	Poop Ain't Gotta Scuffle No More / James Andrews 5:37
13	Mardi Gras Mambo / Hawketts 2:16
14	Ice Cream / George Lewis & His Ragtime Jazz Band 5:48
15	No Doubt About It / J. Monque'D 4:08
16	Don't You Feel My Leg / The Dirty Dozen Brass Band 4:17
17	Dog Hill / Boozoo Chavis 2:38
18	Au Bord de Lac Bijou / Zachary Richard 4:41
19	Mardi Gras in New Orleans / Tuba Fats' Chosen Few Brass Band 6:12
Disc 3
1	Shrimp and Gumbo / Dave Bartholomew 2:05
2	St. Phillip Street Breakdown / Dr. Michael White 5:01
3	Going Back to Louisiana / Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown 4:40
4	Tell It Like It Is / Aaron Neville 2:41
5	The Saints / Coolbone 3:15
6	Canaille / French Rockin' Boogie 3:06
7	Carnival Time / Al Johnson 2:41
8	La Negra Tomasa / Fredy Omar 5:04
9	Let the Good Times Roll / Shirley & Lee 2:24
10	The Broken Windmill / Evan Christopher 3:53
11	Way Down / Champion Jack Dupree 3:48
12	Hallelujah / Raymond Anthony Myles Live 3:58
13	I Hear You Knocking / Smiley Lewis 2:45
14	La Crève de Faim (Starvation 2-Step) / Steve Riley & the Mamou Playboys 3:07
15	Main Street Blues / Red Stick Ramblers 4:37
16	Sea Cruise / Frankie Ford 2:44
17	Tee-Nah-Nah / Henry Butler Live 3:49
18	Smoke That Fire / New Birth Brass Band 3:06
19	Give Him Cornbread / Zydeco Hi-Rollers Live 4:15
20	I Like It Like That / Chris Kenner 1:57
21	Classified / James Booker Live / Version Two 3:08
22	Southern Nights / Allen Toussaint 3:34
Disc 4
1	Tipitina / Professor Longhair 2:39
2	Party / The Wild Magnolias 4:43
3	Dr. Jazz / Ellis Marsalis 4:29
4	Ooh Poo Pah Doo / Troy Andrews 3:15
5	South of I-10 / Sonny Landreth 3:40
6	Lipstick Traces (On a Cigarette) / Benny Spellman 2:25
7	The Right Key But the Wrong Keyhole / Charmaine Neville Live 5:46
8	Rip It Up / Little Richard 2:23
9	Royal Garden Blues / Kid Ory's Creole Jazz Band 3:31
10	Stoned, Drunk & Naked / Anders Osborne 4:52
11	Laissez Faire (Let It Be) / Bruce Daigrepont 2:28
12	Digga-Digga-Do / New Orleans Jazz Vipers Live 5:25
13	Tailspin / Walter "Wolfman" Washington 3:03
14	Lawdy Miss Clawdy / Lloyd Price 2:32
15	Havin' Fun in New Orleans / Eddie Bo 5:01
16	King of the Mardi Gras / Tim Laughlin 4:03
17	Red Beans / Snooks Eaglin 3:53
18	S.U.V. / The Membership 3:43
19	'Tits Yeux Noirs (Little Black Eyes) / Savoy-Doucet Cajun Band 3:49
20	Lazy River / Pete Fountain Live 3:39
21	Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans? / Louis Armstrong & His Dixieland Seven 2:58

Barnes & Noble

America's most musical city is a daunting topic for any collection, even a four-disc box set. From Dixieland, jazz, blues, rock 'n' roll, R&B, and funk to the Francophone world of swamp pop, Cajun, and zydeco to the folk musics of vodou and the Mardi Gras Indians, the Crescent City has a number of musical histories to tell. Fortunately, it also supplies a homegrown metaphor: gumbo. That savory stew of disparate ingredients is mirrored in the magpie assortment of music -- old, new, Cajun, and very blue -- on parade here. Any New Orleans cook will tell you that the secret to gumbo is the roux, the concentrated base of the dish, and compiler Chuck Taggart (who supplies enlightening track-by-track notes) gets that base just right. You couldn't have a New Orleans box without Louis Armstrong, Sidney Bechet, Professor Longhair, Ernie K. Doe, Fats Domino, and the Meters -- and they're all here. Of course, they're mostly limited to a track or two a piece, but that's the nature of a set like this. Spice-wise, this set swings toward the jazzy sounds of black New Orleans, leaving more rural Cajun numbers as palate-cleansers, and this, too, is as it should be, popular conceptions of the Big Easy to the contrary. The Big Ol' Box endeavors to be something of a not-for-tourists guide -- it hits the expected sites but also the names that fill the weekly listings of OffBeat, the local music bible. John Cleary, Galactic, the Iguanas, Anders Osborne, even Fredy Omar, the city's resident salsa bandleader, have their moment. The contrast between classic material from Alan Toussaint and Ernie K-Doe and some lighter-weight contemporary interpretations is more often than not felicitous, with only a few clunkers coming from the current generation (James Booker's "Classified" is NOLA blues at its most derivative). But there's so much love in the collection -- a hilarious list of "why we love New Orleans" is a highlight of the liner notes -- that it's easy to overlook even these. The best test of a collection like this is to just put it on, one disc after another -- and if it isn't the soundtrack to one helluva party, then grits ain't groceries and you've never been to New Orleans. Mark Schwartz

All Music Guide

It reads splendidly on paper: Shout Factory's Doctors, Professors, Kings and Queens: The Big Ol' Box of New Orleans is a traveler's guide to the legendary city's rich musical heritage. Over the course of four discs, it attempts to touch on all of the kinds of music associated with New Orleans -- everything from brass bands and piano blues to zydeco, jazz and klezmer -- and represent recordings from the '20s to the modern day. Add an 84-page book, complete with advice on where tourists should go in the Crescent City, and it seems like this is the definitive word on New Orleans. Well, not quite. While the idea of mixing eras is theoretically appealing, since it would emphasize common threads within New Orleans music, it winds up being distracting not only because of the different qualities of recordings, but because the sequencing isn't logical; instead of leading the listener through the changes, subtly instructing on the similarities between the seemingly dissimilar styles, the box seems like it's stuck on shuffle-play, whipping between songs without much rhyme or reason. And that haphazard sequencing brings another troubling flaw with the set into sharp relief: the musicians behind the recent recordings simply aren't a patch on the giants that provide New Orleans music with its heart, soul, blood and bone. Those musicians are here, no doubt -- Louis Armstrong, Fats Domino, Dave Bartholomew, Allen Toussaint, the Meters, Professor Longhair, Smiley Lewis, the Neville Brothers, Dr. John, Huey "Piano" Smith -- are all here, but when they're combined with solid but undistinguished modern artists, the results are less than definitive. It's pleasant, and representative of what you'd hear on a trip to New Orleans, and the book is highly instructive, but as a pure, enjoyable listening experience, Doctors, Professors, Kings and Queens pales next to previous New Orleans sets. Stephen Thomas Erlewine