High expectations when listening to an orchestra


If you listen to an orchestra and expect to hear the real thing, you’re certain to be disappointed.
There’s no way you can come close to that experience  with your equipment.  An orchestra in your listening space is an impossibility. Therefore you have to adopt a “suspension of disbelief.”  In other words, trick yourself into believing it’s the real  thing.  You have to bring your imagination to the equation.
The degree to which you can suspend your disbelief, will determine how much enjoyment you get.
Of course, the better the quality of your equipment, the closer you will come.
With lesser forces than an orchestra, such as a few instruments or solo instrument or voice, the easier it becomes to approach reality.
rvpiano
@frogman  No worries. I think we were both posing a hypothetical and then arguing against it but didn't realize that. All good.
Even bad live music beats recorded music, on many systems 😎
You really think so? How many minutes of me banging out Chopsticks to change your mind?
unavoidably, our best equipment still acts as a filter to the live sound. but bits and pieces of the experience can be conveyed in variable proportions. in my experience the maggie tympani III speakers come the closest, without a bunch of special effects speakers in the room, all by their lonesome they produced a hemisphere of sound in the acoustically treated room, a cloud of sound if you will, that if i stepped into, it [the recording venue] became palpable to me. 
+1 @millercarbon 

I have so many memories of terrible sounding shows. Seeing the Dead in a hockey stadium from far, far away. Hearing Art Blakey at an outdoor show where the sound bounced around and made my ears hurt. Hearing the Colorado Symphony Orchestra from behind the stage (an in-the-round hall) and barely making out various sections. Hearing Simon and Garfunkle in Central Park from far enough away that the picnickers next to me were just as loud as Art's sweet voice. I won't go on.

I've heard great shows, too. But let's face it -- live music is an aural crap shoot. Give me a great system with a great live recording, and there's far less to overcome, sonically, than exists at many concerts.