Sat front row at the symphony...

Has been in Carnegie Hall for performance of piano with violin (Spivakov)

I could hear coughing and sneezing a lot better than piano and violin. This venue is one of the WORST I've ever been.

Other days had been in Minnesota Symphony Hall and what a difference. I chose seats a-bit away from the front row and music was filling the hall whether it's solo or orchestra.

You don’t even need to go to to an elaborate venue/symphony to appreciate that systems don’t speak the real thing. When my son plays his trombone in our kitchen it alone fills the room in a way that no system can. And even his trombone is a beginner model!

I frequently attend concerts at Boston Symphony Hall given by our outstanding second tier orchestra, the Boston Philharmonic. My series tickets are in the second row behind the mid-hall aisle just off the center. Superb seats for a mix of hall ambience and direct sound. Some prefer front center balcony….mellower balance. I sat in the front row for Beethoven Symphony #9 one year. Overwhelming but not as good to my taste. The recording mics are closer than where I sit, but the engineers capture a lot of what I hear from my seat. Check the Mahler Symphony 6 and 9 by the BPYO under Zander, streaming on your favorite service. 

An experience all of us should have.

Back in 1982 I was a resident physician at a hospital in Akron Ohio. I was reviewing an x ray with an older radiologist and noticed that he had two cassettes with organ pieces on them. Turns out he was a huge organ buff. I copied a rare album of Cesar Frank's Complete Organ works on my Nakamichi Dragon and brought it to his office. Two days later he invited me to a concert at the Richmond Colosseum, the summer home of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. This is an open air venue and also hosts rock concerts. He drives right up to a small building which turns out to have the facility infirmary. He was one of the house physicians. There are four seats in the center boxes reserved for the house physicians. They are first come first serve. He hangs his picture ID from his neck, grabs a beeper and we head out to our seats. If there is an emergency he will get beeped or rather vibrated. That night was the Chicago Symphony Orchestra doing Orff's Carmina Burana. I have four copies of that piece and only one of them comes close to the performance that night. Afterwards we return to the infirmary. He takes me back to a small office, sits me down in front of a Polaroid machine and has my picture taken. I must have wet my pants. He made me a house physician! I could go to any concert I wanted. All I had to do was hang that picture ID around my neck, grab a beeper and take a seat. I never got beeped and I must have attended 20 concerts, all because I recorded a cassette expecting nothing in return, just sharing music with another organ buff.

@crustycoot , I grew up in Newton, just outside of Boston and my dad had season tickets at the BSH supposedly one of finest in the world. As a child I doubt I appreciated the hall acoustics, I just loved the music. I do think I prefer open air venues like Tanglewood.