@bdp24
"Now, there is Jazz I like, names you would expect: Count Basie (man did his band swing!), Ellington, Mose Allison, Ray Charles, early Big Joe Turner, Cab Calloway. Composers including Irving Berlin, Bernstein, Gershwin, etc."
I apologize for my carelessness in making false assumptions.
No excuse, but I suspect I was feeling a bit triggered and "protective" of a genre that seems to have very few fans. In other words, I somehow misread your words as a broad attack on the genre as a whole.
"I listen for for and respond to first form: great chord progressions. melodies, harmonies, etc."
This is true for me, as well. I enjoy improvisation but please (!) give me a nicely crafted melody as a jumping off point, and some actual chord changes, not just a hip riff or a two-chord vamp, repeated ad nauseum. Jazz seems to be heading increasingly away from melody and chord changes, unfortunately.
"Plus, as I said, Bluegrass instruments are more pleasing to me in terms of timbre than is most Jazz".
A matter of personal taste, and therefore, inarguable.
"Jazz music tends to not give me what I’m looking for musically, not as much as do other genres."
It only makes sense for each of us to "follow our bliss" when it comes to aesthetic experiences.
I enjoy your contributions, even if I occasionally have a strange way of showing it ;o)