I don't think there's any profound secret to jazz - except that it used to be a lifestyle and a kind of identity politics. If you played or liked jazz you were

I don't think there's any profound secret to jazz - except that it used to be a lifestyle and a kind of identity politics. If you played or liked jazz you were A Certain Kind of Person in a way that mattered in the late 50s. Not so much today. Musically it's a combination of atmosphere and passion with a cerebral edge, with harmonies that are spicy and colourful but not atonally exotic and incomprehensible. It's improvised moment-by-moment riffs and conversations over a chord chart and some loose linear and structural traditions. It doesn't have the grand architecture of classical music or the cheeky crowd-pleasing crudity and playfulness of pop. Genres either hit you or they don't. It's fine not to like something.