Wild_Child: sure, if a heavy metal vibrato is your choice, it's your sound, and I respect that. But let's not forget you're playing jazz, which has a lot more room and flexibility to allow for personal style to shine through - quite the inverse of classical music. In classical music, the only opportunities for style to be emphasized is through more delicate, discrete aspects of playing, such as phrasing and dynamics. Essentially, this means that if Malmsteen is going to be playing classical music, his style should not be proclaimed through the use of a a wailing, banshee vibrato that sounds like a bird being butchered. His use of shred scale runs, however, is perfectly appropriate, as it emulates Paganini-esque violin passages.
Also, I'm not telling quiksilverdew off for anything
I said if he chooses to employ a wider vibrato, then he should slow it down or he'll end up sounding like Malmsteen which would make him sound like
1) a Malmsteen clone
2) a player with a crappy vibrato
His current vibrato is perfectly fine, and I'd like to say that I much prefer it over Malmsteen's, to say the least.
It's true that I appear to be contradicting myself about the wide vibrato issue - let me explain. Personal style can shine through in any musical genre - but in each genre, different aspects of musical expression are focused on in order to develop style. And in classical music, a classical vibrato is used, period. There simply isn't much room for development of a really unique vibrato. Classical instruments (i.e. strings e.g. violin, winds e.g. clarinet) are technically incapable of producing a vibrato as wild/wide as that coming from Malmsteen's scalloped fretboard Strat. This is why other aspects of musical expression are focused on in classical music (such as the aforementioned phrasing, dynamics). And please let's not get into ebonics discussions here, it's besides the point.
Now, in any genre other than classical music, I don't mind a wide vibrato, or anything else being developed for the sake of personal style. For example, in blues, a good vibrato and fluid bends are important. In metal, a wide vibrato is important to accentuate pinch harmonics, for example. I could go on and on about this. But, being a classically trained musician, it makes me cringe when I see unorthodox techniques being used in classical music - it just doesn't belong there! Malmsteen's wide vibrato wasn't possible back in the 18th century because they didn't have scalloped fretboard Strats or Marshalls back then, so it shouldn't start now... That's what jazz / rock / blues is for!