Sat front row at the symphony...

Composers (and performing musicians) both create their art for all types of listeners with different musical knowledge and different seating preferences.  Music is a business which needs to serve as many customers (listeners, performers, concert halls, etc.) as possible.  The hall needs to be filled for maximum revenue.  Even if most of the seats are unacceptable to me, someone has to sit in those seats and get some enjoyment.  The general public who sits in distant locations hears the balanced, but homogenized sound.  They are not detail oriented a-philes.  They don't analyze the sound, but are content to enjoy the music as part of a social outing.  If they are happy with that, fine.  The composer wants to please these listeners.

Composers also want to please discerning musicians and a-philes like myself. Composers carefully craft the score in great detail.  Composers are perfectionists who edit and revise their work out of pride in making a finished product.  I have studied violin seriously my entire life with 100's of coaches and played with numerous groups, so I know the importance of precision and detail in the service of better competency in performance and learning more about the composer's similar goals.  

I don't know if you have studied scores of music you know.  In my experience, distant seats have no chance of capturing more than a small fraction of the detail that is in the score, which is much better captured by a close listener.  The conductor is in an enviable position of hearing more of this detail and the best balance than anyone else on stage or in the audience.  To see the score and hear this detail from an optimum close position has increased my appreciation of the genius of the composer.  The detail oriented a-phile also puts lots of effort and money into hearing more detail which increases his appreciation of his music at home. "Wow, I never heard that detail before.  This music sounds even better."

As an aside, I'm sure that if you got new eyeglasses that enabled better vision, you appreciated more details in familiar objects.  More details enable more perception of beauty.  Isn't it nice to find a woman's eyes beautiful at 50 feet away with better visual acuity whereas with the old glasses it was a blur and not as beautiful.

I have to say, @viber6 , that while I disagree with your perspective, I have enjoyed your comments (and those of o many others as well) as you make your case.  For me, while it is interesting to occasionally get that up close perspective, and hear all the extraneous noises that performers generate, a steady diet of such fare wears after a while.  Consider those paintings by old masters such as Rembrandt that have been subjected to analysis by XRay and CT scan.  Frequently all kind of detail is revealed that is not apparent to people looking at the picture.  Art aficionados who know these paintings well are always fascinated by these details . That doesn’t mean that this level of analysis is essential to enjoying the painting because the Artist didn’t intend for viewers to see any of it in the finished work.

  Hearing the spit clog a horn players instrument is interesting, but ultimately distracting.  I don’t need to see how the sausage gets made, I just want to enjoy my meal.  And now that I’ve mixed enough metaphors for the evening it’s off to bed

Not only is it not the case that “this level of analysis is essential to enjoying…” a musical work, this perspective misses out on the full expression of what great composers intended.

@viber6, again with respect, I still feel you miss the point. First, when I refer to listening “at a distance” I am not referring to back of the hall. Sure, every hall has some seats that are possibly too far back and not very good seating locations overall. I’m not talking about that.

You refer to detail that is apparent when following a musical score and not heard unless listening up close. I simply can’t agree with that premise. I would say that when listening from up to a mid hall perspective (and probably even somewhat further back) one can hear every detail that is there to be heard and as seen in a score. No, it will not have the separation that is heard up close, but it will be there and in a more musically honest balance. Separation is not necessarily detail. Acoustic sounds need a certain amount of travel distance to fully develop. Moreover, a certain amount of “homogenization” is precisely what great composers want. Lastly, the great composers were (are?) not particularly concerned about pleasing any particular (or all) segment of the concert going public, and certainly not audiophiles. Their main goal is to be true to their artistic vision.

Thanks for your comments, even if we disagree. And, yes, I have studied countless scores as part of my preparation for performance.

To be clear, I should have written: “…one can hear every MUSICAL detail that there is to be heard and as seen in the score”.  As mahler123 points out there are a lot of extraneous “details” that are the result of the physical act of playing an instrument that not only do not add to the music, but can be distractions. This is part of the premise adhered to by musicians of “projecting” the sound.  

If we go back to the start of the thread and read the original post by mikeydee, I believe the statement was all about the enjoyment, and the " impact " the experience made to him. We come to the argument that the best seat in the house is at the podium. I am not up at the podium. I am in the audience....and if I happen to not be in the best seat in the house, it would still be an amazing experience, acoustically. However, I am there to experience the " performance ", and relating this to home audio, many have lost this aspect of why we listen in the 1st place. Just a repeated statement ( ad nauseam ) I make many times here on the "Gon. My best, and Enjoy ! MrD.