[wickawic]

Oh I totally would argue that position. (I am much more familar with jazz than classical). My main argument would come from how the two camps tend to practice. Generally jazz musicians will learn the 'changes' (key changes, common chord progression shapes) to a song, and the melody if it has one. At that point they start improvising. If they are really good their improvisation will include dynamic shifts and they will have good tone, but that tone may clash with other instruments. A jazz player will often learn a song before knowing in what arrangement they will be playing, and will play the same song in many different arrangements.

On the other hand, classical music has tone and dynamics written into the score itself. The entire point of the conductor is to anthropomorphize these features of the music, so you know when she is flailing violently you should play differently than when she is shushing you. Additionally, the tone/timbre of the whole piece is set in stone by the composer; A classical orchestra would never think it was ok to let the flutes take a melody written for the trumpets, etc.