Why I like my home system better than live music

Dracule1, I don't think either experience is better, at least not for me. I don't fret too much about those who want to argue about 'live v canned'. That is stale at best. :-)

I happen share your music preferences and I too enjoy listening to music at home, not because my system sounds 'better' than good seats (Center/Orchestra/7 or 8 rows back), but because it offers me so many opportunities that live performances do not. And, FWIW, my wife and I are are season subscribers to two different orchestras and we attend faithfully, even when it just sounds like it is going to be an experience similar to taking cod liver oil.

At home I select my entire program.
I can change the program at will.
I can interrupt a performance and put on something different. I can listen to a LOT of music that is never performed live but is essential I think and certainly central to my interests.

At home I can eat a hot dog, drink a beer, get up to pee, etc. I can talk. I can take a nap. Ah, those creature comforts!

But as importantly, I can by pressing a button or two, actually analyze what I'm listening to in detail by simply replaying movements or parts thereof. I can put on other performances to compare how others have done the same piece. I can actually learn something about things that are important to me!

Frankly I feel sorry for folks who can't, or won't, experience the benefits of listening to music in both venues without getting all bound up about the sonic differences of equipment or formats.

But, that's just me...................

Newbee, I whole heartedly agree with you.

Dracule1, I already read your post three times. How many times do you want me to read it?

Not everything is a matter of opinion. Some things are a matter of fact and unless you are comparing your system to live acoustic music it really doesn't mean much.

I'm around a lot of live music, including right in my home or listening room. Anyone that says you can't reproduce live sound, to the point you can't tell the difference, on an audio system, is making too broad of a generalization. I've never heard a symphony orchestra reproduced convincingly, but it is absolutely practical to convincingly reproduce a piano, a flute, a violin, or even a full drum kit. In the case of a flute, I've had the musician playing along with herself on a studio-recorded CD while she was standing between my speakers. It wasn't a quite a perfect match, mostly because the recording wasn't all that great (I suspect the mic), but it was very, very close.

A drum kit takes one hell of an audio system to reproduce correctly. Especially cymbals. Most tweeters suck in power handling. I've only heard two speakers *ever* that got cymbals just right, and I bought one of them. But it is possible to do a very convincing reproduction of my wife's DW drum kit.

The problem is that I usually don't want a real, actual drum kit reproduced in my listening room. It's too loud. When my wife gets all worked up passionately playing I don't even want to stand nearby. I want to be about 20 feet away. It needs to be a very large room to sound pleasant. A flute in my listening room, yes. Maybe a sax (a sax can be very loud), certainly a piano (we have one), also a cello. A rock band? No.

Amplified live music is usually terrible. You're usually listening to a PA system no one here would have in their listening room. Even the local jazz scene has become terrible. They mic everything, and pump them up with hundreds of watts of PA. Yuck. There is exactly one place we've found where we can listen to unamplified acoustic jazz. (It's awesome).

I don't expect my home audio system to sound like a live performance, because I seldom play it that loud. Live and realistic are two different concepts, I think. I expect a drum kit to sound absolutely realistic, but I don't often want to sound live.

Rrog, I used to think like you too, but my experience has taught me you don't need to compare your system to live music to enjoy your system. When I listen to reproduced music, I don't think to myself "Wow, I wonder how it sounds live". I just enjoy. Although I attend live music on most weekends, often I find live music is not that enjoyable. So don't get so hung up on live music. It's not the end all, be all to enjoy music. Again, you gave your opinion, as I have.