well, all this is interesting but not exactly what i was trying to get at. which was that the arranger suffers from an image problem just as a minivan does. a "sporty" suv is only really sporty if it goes off-road. otherwise, it's just the boxy body style that is considered more "cool " than the slope-nose sliding-door minivan, but the mini actually is a more practical vehicle that rides and handles better to boot. several of you have addressed that, and the analogy i drew seems even more valid if u are right and the arranger can do 95% of what a workstation can, except for
maybe a couple of things the workstation excels at just
as the "off-road' capability of suv(which only 5% use)

As far as creativity w/ many styles available, to me that's
just an unnecessary distraction. the greatest art is made within narrow limits, too much choice waters it down. if
i have a dozen great styles, that's more than enough for me to make really interesting music from, as a jazz player. In fact, if a great jazz player has only 5 or 6 of those styles, he would be more engaging and less boring than all of the rest using dozens of styles and sounds. As far as i'm concerned, the more styles and sounds any of you would use, the less i would be interested in what you had to say musically. Check out the Ray Charles-Jerry lee lewis-Fats Domino video on "no arranger"thread here
recently. Howe many sounds, styles are they using? I rest my case

------------------
Miami Mo