Jazz Piano?

Art Tatum's piano teacher was his mother-who was classiclly trained.

At the risk of putting too fine a point on it,Tatum can be broken down into three periods. His third period is over my head but I listen to his second period stuff with my mouth opened in amazement.(See volume three of John Mehigan's JAZZ IMPROVISATION series for more.)

If you Google "Art Tatum"---"I feel lucky" ,you'll connect to a site of a private individual who will sell you an anthology disk(s). It sounds like a remaster of 50 to 60 year old recordings,but that's ok. The artistic merit of the work justifies it.

Check out Bill Evans 'Sunday at the Village Vanguard and/or Waltz for Debby.

Pure full swing fun: Gene Harris Trio plus One (the one being Stanley Turrentine)

jazz is a wonderful/terrible word to describe an enormous range of musical expression. at 24, you're "not supposed to like it"? otoh, i have a good friend who similarly perhaps, finds that a lot of jazz starts out with an (annoying) eclectic & somewhat "honking" melody line, and then takes off in a million different directions. later, you hear a few repeats of the somewhat lacking "theme", and then a rousing finish. so he proudly prefers r&r or popular music these days, but once upon a time was a huge fan of van morrison, frank zappa, & jethro tull. i was lucky- my father brought home a copy (now out of print) of dave brubeck's "my favorite things", my 1st real exposure to jazz. it's melodic, demonstrates a straightforward approach to improvisation, the songs aren't too long or too short, and each one is a classic. and, paul desmond is a treasure- no squeaks, honks, or stratospheric runs- just melodies within melodies. but getting a sense of what "jazz music" is is like christopher columbus trying to figure out where he was and where he was going next. my big dumb suggestion- watch ken burns' jazz documentary from beginning to end, and jot down what sounds good to you.