Sat front row at the symphony...

 I live in Chicago and regularly attend concerts there, but we have family in Boston, New York and Detroit so we regularly attend concerts there as well.  Detroit Orchestra Hall is actually an acoustic gem and a beautiful hall, obviously not as well known as the other cities mentioned  but probably my favorite of the 4 mentioned here .  Next would be Boston, and then a bit of a drop to Chicago Symphony Center, and I would continue to rank New York last, but now much improved.  Internationally, my experience is confined to Barcelona, Vienna, the Rudolfinum in Prague, Amsterdam, and the Garbage Can—oops, the Barbican— in London.  I would love to attend concerts in Germany, and I had a trip that would have taken us to Leipzig, Hamburg, Munich and Berlin wiped out by the Pandemic

You have a wealth of concert hall experience.  I love the mono recordings on Mercury of Rafael Kubelik + Chicago SO in Orchestra Hall (I guess renamed Symphony Center).  Have you tried a few locations there to compare the recordings with what you hear live?  Boston Symphony Hall was great in the 4th row center when I was there 2016.  I heard the Boston Philharmonic Youth Orch conducted by Benjamin Zander.  Zander is a world class conductor, so the best deal is hearing an excellent student orch at their best with a great conductor.  White fluorescent lighting was used.  The tonality was clear, cool and neutral, unlike the warm, HF rolled off quality in Carnegie.  Sensory perception overlaps with sound and vision.  I wonder if Carnegie used cool white light, whether the tone would then be cooler and less warm than it is.

In the Concertgebouw, I sat in about the 10th row center.  Muddy, syrupy warm sound.  This correlates with what I hear on recordings from European halls--distant and muddy.

Prices are insane in major famous halls with famous orchestras and soloists.  People who are willing to pay $700 for the balcony in Chicago have no idea what details they are missing vs much closer to the stage.  My strategy is to get a modestly priced seat on the main floor as close as I can get.  5 min before the start, I survey empty seats, and then 1 min before the lights dim, I dash for the empty center seats much closer.  Acoustics don't matter much to me, since I want the maximum detail of the 1st row.

Mischa Mischakoff was the most esteemed concertmaster of the 20th century.  He was with the NBC Symphony under Toscanini, and I love his solos on those recordings.  When he retired, he was with the Detroit Symphony.  I visited him in Detroit in 1975.  He invited me to hear him at a small private quartet concert.  He preferred his Belgian violin to his Strad.  I declared him the greatest violinist I had heard.  But the socially minded dean of my medical school said, no, Heifetz was the greatest violinist of the 20th century.  Well, everyone sorta knows that, but to really appreciate the finer, subtle qualities of a great artist, you have to be a real connoisseur.  

The Musikverein in Vienna is considered to be the #1 hall, but kudos to you for discovering Detroit as #1.

frogman,

Violin concertos are carefully scored for orchestra realizing the inherent SPL limitations of a solo violin.  For the great concertos, the orch is reduced to pianissimo when the solo violin is playing.  When the violin soloist takes a break, the orchestra plays in all its loud glory.  But the violin is rarely playing when the orch is playing with full sound.  The violin and orch are kinda like respectful politicians letting the other speak while the other only listens.  When politicians are trying to yell at the same time, there is chaos.  It is a legitimate tactic of the recording engineer to boost the SPL of the violin by close miking in order to get more equality between the soloist and orch, even if the natural balance is altered.

Piano concertos live have more satisfactory balance, since the piano is a much larger, louder instrument than the violin, and often the piano joins the orchestra in the full glory of both.

What instrument(s) do you play professionally?

I grew up in Detroit.  One of my friends was a violinist who took lessons from Mishakoff in the mid seventies, and I met him a few times, as he used to lead the Youth Orchestra my buddy was in (they played the Bach Double together).  I went to Medical School in Detroit in the early eighties when they were just starting to restore it.  I didn’t get to hear the finished product until a few years ago, and while the acoustics are wonderful, it’s also visually a wonder as well.

   $700 for a balcony seat in Chicago?  We pay $100 for ours.

   Can’t agree with your comments about Vienna or Amsterdam