I'm classically trained but really enjoy playing these. They're hard enough to be challenging yet not something you have to practice for months like many classical pieces. An especially good thing for sight reading is that instead of lots of fast passages like in a lot of classical music, there are lots of chords where you have to read and play 8 notes on a beat. With time (I did this for about a year), you start reading entire chords by sight rather than individual notes.
Working to get better at sight reading makes learning new music much more enjoyable. You could probably do it by reading a lot of classical music below your playing level too, but for me, the jazz stuff is a nice break and something different.
I bought a ton of books in this series and started spending time every day playing them:
https://www.amazon.com/Bill-Evans-Jazz-Piano-Solos/dp/145840...
I'm classically trained but really enjoy playing these. They're hard enough to be challenging yet not something you have to practice for months like many classical pieces. An especially good thing for sight reading is that instead of lots of fast passages like in a lot of classical music, there are lots of chords where you have to read and play 8 notes on a beat. With time (I did this for about a year), you start reading entire chords by sight rather than individual notes.
Working to get better at sight reading makes learning new music much more enjoyable. You could probably do it by reading a lot of classical music below your playing level too, but for me, the jazz stuff is a nice break and something different.