Why in the world would someone spend 6-8 hours listening to a piece of music they dislike just so they can like it? If I already have thousands of pieces of music I enjoy listening to, why should I put any effort into liking even more music?

I don't buy the article's conclusion that people should listen to jazz because otherwise they are "missing a huge chunk of what life has to offer". Everyone is missing out on a huge chunk of what life has to offer! Time spent gaining appreciation for music is not spent doing something else. Who is anyone to tell anyone else what chunks of life they should be exploring?

I have an alternate theory for why Americans don't like jazz. They don't like jazz because they don't hear a lot of jazz. They do like lyrical forms of music because they are exposed to a lot of it in the course of their daily lives. Why is a purposefully acquired taste superior to one that didn't require effort?