Hi Joe,
Welcome to Sonic Junction. You ask a lot of good questions ... let me try and take them one by one.
The fact you've been playing all of your life is a real gift, meaning that music and playing your instrument is likely in-grained in your mind similar to a language ... which is a tremendous advantage. How much depends on the amount you have played and listened to over the years ... but from your post, sounds like a good bit (which is great).
Restlessness and looking for a new perspective is also good sign ... this often happens when the mind is looking for something new and/or your looking to express something different emotionally through your music. From what I've experienced in my life, this restlessness and/or dissatisfcation with the status quo is what often spurs me to create ... whether it be music or something like Sonic Junction.
What attracts me to Duke is his range, depth and character. Meaning, I enjoy everything from his chicago blues lessons to how he voices certain chord fragments on swing tunes to playing classic jazz standards. Duke stretches me in ways that inspire me to learn and create. The word inspire is very important to me personally and from the studies people have done is the most important factor determining how fast and for how long they will learn music (surprisingly much more important that innate musical ability).
In terms of getting new licks, it's very common to take ideas from different genres and instruments and apply them to different tunes. Over the year Duke's shown how he takes jazz piano licks (In Crowd) and talked about listening to great vocalists (such as Ella Fitzgerald) to get phrasing ideas. So I think the more important question is do you want to bring Duke's swing ideas into your playing.
Your comment about not being able to think fast enough caught my attention. Typically, that means you haven't practiced and/or listened in that space enough. Using the language analogy, try in your minds eye to observe what's in your mind as you speak. It's usually not the words, but the intention. From what I've observed, it's the same for great musicians. A test you can do is put down your instrument and see if you can create lines that you like in your head as you hear a song. If you can, then you've probably listened enough and need to work on linking the muscle memory of your fingers to the music in your mind (this is my current challenge). If you can't hear the lines in your head, then you should probably listen more too.
The song approach is how most great blues, rock, folk, gospel and early / mid jazz musicians learned to play. That said, either way can work. The arguement for the song approach is that you engrain in your mind all of the great melodies and ideas of the masters vs. the "grammar" of music. My advice here is to do what-ever inspires you and gets you to pick up your instrument and play / create.
For me, being able to learn directly from Duke, Corey and Jerry is priceless. Not only from what I've learned, but I finally understand how great musicians approach and think about music. In Jerry's words "he's not only given me the fish, but taught me how to fish for myself." The single biggest impact for me is that my fingers are now starting to link directly with the music I hear in my head. I'm an engineer by training, so before I started learning at Sonic Junction I would visualize scales and play around them. It worked grammatically, but musically it lacked emotion and I grew tired of hearing myself play. Now I'm finding myself just hearing a piece and the fingers automatically play the phrase. I'm also hearing the phrasing and nuances of music and have started applying it to my playing. Finally, it's just fun seeing everyone each week who all are dedicating a portion of their life to something they love and all have in common.
I hope my answer has helped and wish you all the best in your musical journey.
