My audiophile take on the symphony last night.

Just a comment on volume - My local symphony is about 110 musicians and they play in a 900 seat theater. From my seats dead center 10-12 rows back, the volume is perfect and sonically wonderful. I just started going last year, inspired by my audiophilia, and it's true, there is nothing better than a live performance of unamplified music.

Prcinka,

I never had hifi system better then live event...

Well, perhaps you have...consider a live amplified concert in a sports arena versus hearing the album, i.e. analog - hehe, at home.

From Fleetwood Mac to Stevie Wonder and Pablo Cruise to Earth, Wind, and Fire -- the sonics were superior, read more enjoyable, on the record than at the concert...no disrespect intended to FOH pros. It was certainly LOUDER at the concerts, however.

I believe what we may often hear from our rigs is artifact, yet a potentially true facsimile of what is present in the source media, i.e., fidelity to the source which should not be conflated with fidelity of the performance...

Best regards,
Sam

****"Funny thing about live music - no matter how bad the acoustics are, you can tell it's live and not recorded." (-Chayro)

Probably true. What our ears hear when listening is only part of the story though.**** -Mapman

C1ferrari, what Mapman wrote is quite a mouthful. It all depends on what aspect of the listening experience we each find most rewarding. There is no substitute for that "hard to describe" immediacy of hearing performers live; even when amplified in less than excellent fashion, in less than excellent acoustics. IMO, unless the acoustics and sound design are a complete disaster and make the experience unbearable, there is something special about hearing music closer to the source, with fewer electronics and less processing in-between.

I like to close my eyes on occasion during live concerts and when listening at home. This helps me assess each relative to each other based only on what I hear better.

When I do this, I often think I would not know for certain which I am listening to by just listening alone. There are so many variables involved even with just what you hear!

At present, as long as I do not hear any artificial artifacts that are only involved with recordings (very bad recordings, hiss, pops/clicks, audible distortions affecting acoustic instruments, blatantly artificial sounding stereo effects, etc.) its often hard to tell. In a blind test, with the right recorded test material and similar venues, I think I could very well fail to identify live versus recorded consistently.

I think?

Matching the scale and acoustics of larger live venues at home is a challenge only very few have any prayer of accomplishing ever. So you do have to accept the fact that your home listening venue is often the bottleneck no matter what regardless of how much you might pour into your system and room.

Mapman wrote: "I think I could very well fail to identify live versus recorded consistently."

I sincerely hope you do not actually believe this statement, no matter what the circumstances. I would submit that there is no way anyone should ever fail to tell the difference. If one cannot, then you have VERY bad ears indeed, and I do not believe that you do.