Jazz for aficionados

O-10, glad you are enjoying "Pilgrinage"; there is a lot to like there and I agree it is accessible.  Speaking for myself, I know that there was a time when I would not have thought so.  We all grow as listeners if we let it happen.  Sometimes we don't even realize that it is happening.  I hope that I am being neither presumptuous nor am taking too many liberties when I say that over the course of the life of this thread we all have grown as listeners.  You make some good points, but I would say this and none of it is intended as criticism or disrespect of anyone.  It is a "musician thing" only to a degree.  What I mean is I know and have known non-musicians who understand those "galaxies" and "parts unknown" very well; believe or not, better than some "musicians" that I have known.  Imo, it is a matter of wanting to understand and not put up our own roadblocks to understanding.  However, for some listeners that is a kind of "work" or effort.  Some of us want to do that and others don't.  A personal call and not applicable to everyone.  Also, assuming that what the player is doing is not, in fact, "noodling" (aka bulls&!+) I don't think that it is that "musician's speed is faster than his ideas"; it is instead that the musician's ideas are faster than the listener's speed.  You are quite right, there are plenty of bulls$!+ers out there, but I don't think that Trane (or Brecker) were two of them.

Frogman, time, time and time again, the same thing has been said about "Trane"; he goes to galaxies out in the far reaches of the universe. I believe musicians are impressed by the complexity of what he's playing, while people like me are saying; "But it don't sound like squat".

Since "Trane" is one of the greatest musicians who ever lived, that statement is "Blasphemy". No matter who is blowing, I divide the music into two categories; this sound good, that don't.

O-10, musicians are not impressed by the complexity, they are impressed by the incredibly high level of the MUSIC he is making. The person who first introduced me to Trane decades ago was not a musician; he was a jazz fan and loved Trane’s music, including music from his "out" period.