I use a pdf to midi converter to help me decipher tricky Bill Evans, Charlie Parker, Jarrett, Hancock transcriptions. The output is highly quantized and every note has identical velocity.

Even then, the performance is often remarkable. There is a (quantized, even velocity) midi of Jarrett’s My Funny Valentine, somewhere on the net. The harmony, the variation between straight and triplet playing, the sudden changes from eight notes to flurries of 16th notes or 16th triplets, the changes in octaves, largely make up for the quantization.

Real good players have great time and you’d be surprised how close they get. As stated above, play it perfectly or... imo... quantize it, or like in Ableton “warp” it if it’s audio.

Some commercial midis of Pat Metheny’s music are quantized (to help reduce the file size in MIDI). But with varying velocity. Anyone who has ever heard the Midi of Third Wind or Are you going with me, James, American Garage... can agree: quantized music is not necessarily sterile or lifeless. Rather, it blows your mind.

The human ear is quite tolerant of little lags or leaps, but has little tolerance for sloppiness. And I know, cause I’m not a great musician and it even bothers me. smile

There’s two possible answers, I think: play really good, quantize... both will do.

Biab, Kontakt, Sampletank and lots of nice libraries, from Fluffy audio to Abbey Road drums.
Check out these great contemporary Jazz Styles: www.jazzstylezz.com