Well since we are turning this into guitar solo talk.....haha....Dio’s version of Dream On with Malmstein on the guitar is head and shoulders above the original.....David Ruffin’s slimmed down version of Smiling Faces (knowing his history with his former temptations group members) is an example of less being more....
Well, obviously, you can find some outstanding solos with lots of notes. It’s not a requirement to be minimalistic.
But.... it is a common beginner mistake to make a solo too showy and busy than is necessary, so minimalism is a good cure for that ailment. I guess my point is that just because you can doesn’t mean that you should, and inexperienced players don’t usually know when they should.