That’s a great post. I have educated my self into appreciating jazz by reading and listening. The more one listens , say to the almost infinite renditions of a Round Midnight the more one is cued in on where the music is coming from and going.
In My Favourite Things Coltrane’s sax chews the melody and takes it to very dark places before one again bringing it out in the sun and the meadows and the daisies.
Kurt Elling puts words ( vocalese) on Coltrane’s Pursuance from A Love Supreme that morphs this immortal piece into something like his own personal invocation to a pantheon of deities.
Another example- St Thomas ( a George and Ira Gershwin composition ) in Saxophone Collosus sounds quite tame and sanitised compared to the jagged live b/w version by Rollins that’s commonly available on YouTube.
There are other more contemporary versions of it by say Joshua Redman ( one which begins with very long vamp) and which includes other cats like Brad Melihu besides those by Michel Petruciani , Branford Marsalis etc.
That’s why I feel when going to a jazz concert it would be a good idea to have some acquaintance with the repertoire that would be laid out so that one would have done the homework to enhance ones appreciation and enjoyment. But some would say that would be too much like attending a classical concert.
Because the beauty of jazz is in the improvisation and the hide and seek that the cat plays with you.