Must admit that it strikes me as rather odd to claim that bebop’s appeal is limited almost entirely to jazz musicians (a relatively small group), when so many of its players are household names or nearly so. Charlie Parker? Dizzy Gillespie? John Coltrane? This is like saying that David Lynch is an acquired taste — well, maybe, but somebody’s paying to see his films and they’re not all surrealist buffs.
I think “very small” is an overstatement. Millions enjoy this genre and the music continues to attract new fans and sell well. In relation to those who prefer, say, country music or pop, the number is small; but within the community of jazz lovers, I’d say it’s as popular as many other forms, and more so than some.
WordMan: Missed seeing your link first time through. Great minds think alike, but I have no excuse.
I was gonna say Bebop sounds like Donatello (both were voiced by Barry Gordon).
Heh. Not till the end of the clip did my brain, suddenly and violently, put it together that Shredder was Uncle Phil.
Thanks everyone. I now know what bebop sounds like.
If you’re curious, my reaction is, at first, “This is great,” then after about ten seconds, “OK, I get it.”
If you’re at a good club, with a good drink and good, music-loving friends and good bebop is on, it is really fun - and if the music is coming from a live small combo, wow…
I have to say that just coming in here to post a joke got me more good jazz than eight hours of the crap jazz station they insist on playing at my store. And I don’t mean the even worse “smooth jazz” commercial station. I mean the self-important local station that spends more time listing where and when an individual song was recorded and begging for money than actually playing jazz music.
Definitely a plausible claim. 
Yes, playing and listening to bebop can be difficult, but that is a result of the tempo, chord substitutions, and the improvisational skills needed, not because its goal is to be difficult. The goal is creative expression while pushing harmonic, rhythmic and melodic boundaries. A lot of people do not like to be challenged, whether it is film (Paranoid Randroid: great example with Lynch), literature, music, etc.
Also ftr, I don’t quite understand what people mean when they say that bebop music is musically difficult. Technically difficult, yes, but the notes I’m hearing fit quite well with the chords I’m hearing.
Maybe it’s generational? Cultural? Perhaps bebop and related movements succeeded in changing what counts as “fitting” with what.
Calling it “noise” seems really strange to me, though.
That was a common descriptive when the music first emerged. Jazz critics and musicians alike pretty much universally dismissed it as “noise” with “too many notes”, and refused to acknowledge the musical genius that was behind it. I’ll grant the fact that sometimes the solos can become tedious in the hands of somebody who overstays their welcome (if two minutes is good, ten minutes must be great). But it was the logical next step forward from swing. After Louis Armstrong traded trumpet for vocal (yes, he still played, but not nearly as much as he did in the 20s and 30s), that left few people to fill the void. Big bands took over and jazz stagnated. The young lions like Parker, Gillespie and Davis came on the scene and turned the music on its ear, which was inevitable. Their only fault was in being ahead of their time.
In this thread, I discuss some thoughts about why folks don’t like jazz and some tips for listening to jazz that a person may not pick up by listening to other genres. In the OP, I discuss how to follow time and the difference between a jazz solo vs. the leads you hear in other types of music. I suspect that issues like this are what lead many folks to dismiss jazz as “noise.”
Your ears appreciate dissonance and tension/release (which are not only found in bebop, of course). You get it. 
Usually describing any music as “noise” is very unenlightened. Unless the composer is attempting to create noise.
The general rule of thumb for any art is: If you don’t understand what you’re seeing or hearing, it’s not the fault of what you’re looking at or listening to. Saying that you don’t like something when you haven’t taken the time to educate yourself about it is to reveal your ignorance. I’m using the generic “you” here, BTW ;).
One way that bebop sounds is:
shoo-wop shoo-wop, my ba-by oooooo (“seems like a mightly long time…”)
as you shift your weight from side to side from one foot to the other, arms draped over shoulders and around waists at the sock-hop in the gym.
Are you thinking of doo-wop?
Or she bop?
Or KidzBop?
Well, I’m not sure I agree 100% that being difficult is not at least a goal, though I agree entirely with the rest of the post. Actually I’d even say that your following sentence “creative expression while pushing harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic boundaries” might be the expression of the goal of being difficult. Coltrane’s Giant Steps is a great example. Because it’s so difficult to play, it’s largely seen as a kinda milestone for a jazz musician when they can finally handle it. And I’ve no doubt that the difficulty was part of the excitement for Coltrane.
At the same time, and to your point, it’s still a melodic tune that stays in your head. It’s artistically interesting on a number of levels. The name itself refers to the chord changes (which move in m3rds, not just a step, but a giant step), and it feels like some big guy taking giant steps (to me at least). It’s beautiful, difficult music.