Hi guys - I wanted to chime in on the conversation about recording spaces for a moment that Bryon and Mapman are having. I don't think that anyone has made the point here that one would almost never want their music to sound like the actual recording space, if we are assuming that this space is a recording studio. These are very dead environments that do not enhance the music whatsoever, meaning how the music actually sounds in that space as it is actually being played. What these types of rooms do enhance is the recording engineer's ability to make the recording sound exactly how he wants it to (which very often has nothing to do with how the musicians want it to sound, by the way). This point we have discussed on other threads, but it is certainly applicable here.
A related point, which has also been discussed on other threads, is that in general, musicians normally choose fidelity to the performance vs. fidelity to the recording of that performance (a whole bunch of recordings out there really suck, even if the performances are excellent, and why the heck would you want to be faithful to such a recording??). I think Elizabeth touches on this when she speaks of "slighty euphonic coloring." Most musicians want their systems to sound as lifelike as possible (timbres first and foremost), as opposed to trying to eliminate all "distortions." A whole lot of folks who attempt to do the latter end up with systems that throw the baby out with the bathwater, or lose the forest for the trees. Neither the recording nor the system it is played back on will ever be an exact match to the performance, as others have correctly pointed out here.
A related point, which has also been discussed on other threads, is that in general, musicians normally choose fidelity to the performance vs. fidelity to the recording of that performance (a whole bunch of recordings out there really suck, even if the performances are excellent, and why the heck would you want to be faithful to such a recording??). I think Elizabeth touches on this when she speaks of "slighty euphonic coloring." Most musicians want their systems to sound as lifelike as possible (timbres first and foremost), as opposed to trying to eliminate all "distortions." A whole lot of folks who attempt to do the latter end up with systems that throw the baby out with the bathwater, or lose the forest for the trees. Neither the recording nor the system it is played back on will ever be an exact match to the performance, as others have correctly pointed out here.