One guitar, or three?

@bdp24

When it comes to Bluegrass I am definitely of two minds.I don't listen to Bluegrass very much when I crank up the stereo but I do actually play a lot of it.

It tends to be the genre my fingers automatically gravitate to when I pick up my admittedly Bluegrass-centric musical instruments -- fiddle, banjo and steel-string acoustic guitar. It is fun as heck to go to Bluegrass jams. By the same token, however, more often than not Bluegrass players tend to be cold technicians who value flash & cliche over heart & finesse. There's a sameness to the chosen tempo(s) and touch that drives me crazy.

I might mention, too, that the folks who play what is Bluegrass' precursor, Old Time, genuinely hate what is designated Bluegrass. It's kind of funny to hang out & play alongside both crowds.

@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)

Wishbone Ash and the Outlaws I think. 

Iron Maiden's been doing three guitars since 1999 and they do it quite well IMHO.

@edcyn: There are actually two schools of Bluegrass: Traditional, and Progressive. There are Bluegrass players who perform exclusively in one of the two schools, and others who do both---for instance one of my favorite living musicians, dobro player Jerry Douglas. He plays traditionally when working in a band providing accompaniment for singers such as Alison Krauss and Iris Dement, and progressive when he leads his band in mostly instrumental music.

I’ve seen & heard Jerry live doing both, and much prefer the Bluegrass music he makes in Traditional style. His solo band is sort of a Bluegrass/Jazz Fusion band! I went and saw he and his band last time they came through Portland, and got bored: too much instrumental soloing, not enough song playing. As I said above, it is song’s I love, not the technical ability of musicians. The skill set required to be an excellent accompanist are very different from those required to be a superior soloist and/or improviser.

As I was saying in an above post, I find music made with virtuoso playing as it’s primary focus---the very essence of much Jazz---often disregards the concept of the song or composition, many of them barely qualifying to be considered a real song (but then the same can be said of Bruce Springsteen’s "songs" ;-). I hear far too much Jazz in which there is no real song at all, just a couple of chords repeated ad nauseam, of use only as the platform for which to solo over (Grateful Dead, anyone? ;-) . Sometimes not even two chords, just one! No employment of modulation, inversion, harmony, counterpoint, or any other musical technique for interesting song development. Sure, the musicians are great on their instrument, but does that alone make for interesting, compelling music? IMO, no.