AT TIMES, yes, even Emerson, Wakeman, whoever are your personal favorite keyboard players would sustain something in their LH, and solo like a madman over the top of it. AT TIMES.

At other times, they would play full keyboard parts, whether piano, synths, organs, you name it. At other times, they would play complex stuff on two (or more!) different keyboards at the same time. Contrapuntal stuff, complex rhythmical stuff, jazzy stuff, you name it.

And don't get me started on jazz keyboard players!

Look, don't get defensive... YOU were the ones slamming the use of SMF's. Just because apparently a large percentage of you think that doing so involves downloading a probably pirated commercial SMF off of some website, opening it on the sequencer in your arranger, and playing something over the top of it without the SLIGHTEST effort at editing it, or muting all the parts you want to play (or CAN play) other than MAYBE the melody track, doesn't mean that that is ALL it can do...

You see? Feel free to trivialize one form of making music with machines (it's what we are ALL doing, don't kid yourself), but get outraged when somebody (to make a point) trivializes another...

Yes OF COURSE you CAN do far more than play simple one finger chords with your LH and struggle to get even the melody played correctly in the RH on an arranger... But that doesn't mean an awful lot of people aren't doing it that way (I can't, for instance, remember the last demo anyone posted here where they actually strayed much away from the melody and blew a REAL solo - I know there have been some, but I can't for the life of me remember the last one).

But here you are, all outraged that this has been mentioned...

Well, as a user of completely customized SMF's (as well as arranger mode, and drums and LH bass, too), I guess I am equally outraged over the widespread assumption that playing over SMF's is Karaoke. It's only karaoke if you MAKE it karaoke, and arranger playing is only LH chords, RH melody note IF YOU MAKE IT THAT WAY!

So, while you get all worked up about what I said (I was surprised mc didn't QUITE get around to personally insulting me, what happened? ), try to understand that what some of YOU said about SMF usage is EQUALLY wrong (and right, in some cases!)...

Either mode is as capable of being misused as the other...