Real or Surreal. Do you throw accuracy out the window for "better" sound?

I see a personal preference. What one likes is what one likes. It’s not going to be the same with every person.  
“Accuracy,” within the context of this, is a dubious definition to begin with.  
Accurate…how?  
Unless we were in the studio at the time something was played, we have no reference in determining how “accurately” our audio playback represents those performances. Even if we were in the studio at the time a performance took place, thusly providing such a reference point, after a few weeks (heck, depending on someone’s capacity for retention and auditory processing, maybe even after only a few hours) we have “forgotten” how it “really sounded” in the studio anyway.

I say, “have fun with your music, however that may be.”

Mahgister and hilde45:

I'm not a "nominalist," either, nor was I trying to suggest that either of you might be. ("Not that there's anything wrong with that.") My philosophical intuitions are mostly Kantian these days, after half a century contributing to the discipline. But this is not a philosophy forum.

Reality "in itself" (in the Kantian sense) is inaccessible and not worth even trying to talk about anyway, since it's inaccessible. Still, for practical purposes, "reality" can be said to be the source of the "source," as it were: the performance which the recording attempts to record and that our audio systems attempt to play back. Now, obviously we were not present at the recording session, nor do we have access to the acoustics of the recording studio in which mastering decisions were made. Etc. 

Nevertheless, a violin has a slightly different timbre than a viola (violists and violinists would challenge that qualification "slightly," but I presume you see what I mean). For that matter, a Guarneri violin has a slightly different timbre than an Amati, or a Stradivari. BUT...a "live" violin has a characteristic timbre, whether played in one's living room or in Carnegie Hall. If you are familiar with the sound of a live violin—especially if you are familiar with that sound in the acoustics where your audio system is set up—then you know, in your own head, whether or not, and to what extent, your system reproduces that timbre (mutatis mutandis: again, the differences between a Cremona instrument and a good modern "copy" are subtleties we can argue about in a different thread, and one can parse those differences in terms besides "timbre"). 

Bottom line (for me): I want to be able to hear the "voice" of the first violinist as against that of the second, and I certainly want to hear the voice of a violin in a string quartet as against that of the viola, or the cello. That's partly a matter of timbre, but also of imaging: I like to be able to "see" where the sound is coming from in the recreated "soundstage" of my listening room. That's essential to really following the music: I need to be able to discern the "voices" that make up the Gestalt. And that point bridges the "audiophile" concern for sound quality with the music lover's love of the music: it's difficult to fully appreciate what's in the music without a high level of fidelity to the subtle features of sound quality.

"Reality," as I was using the word (without all the philosophical asides), simply refers to the signature features of the live instrument as a perceptual baseline, against which the "accuracy" of the reproduction must be judged. 

Is this really problematic? Or unclear"

I’m not a "nominalist," either, nor was I trying to suggest that either of you might be. ("Not that there’s anything wrong with that.") My philosophical intuitions are mostly Kantian these days, after half a century contributing to the discipline. But this is not a philosophy forum.

@snilf  Didn’t think you were! I’m a Deweyan pragmatist, so, Kant plus more practice and no ding an sich. I’ll go as far as Peircean Secondness but that’s where I get off.

Your post was not problematic or unclear at all. In fact, a real pleasure to read and I'm 100% in agreement. We see and seek the same thing in audio, no doubt.

Cheers!

The recording engineer take also a perspectival angle on this reality pie which is also himself ...My system is a link between my acoustic perspective and his own trade -off...And the recording engineer and me we can partake the same conscious inner core through acoustics knowledge...

The timbre of a violin dont exist in itself in some inaccessible absolute reality or truth over all others ... The violin timbre is always a relativized perspective from some location , for some ears, from some material violin design wood etc... Even the violonist does not have the truth about the playing timbre experience..His near position implicate a trade-off exactly as each musician playing around and exactly as any listener will have their "truth" experience about the timbre experience and they will recognize it and they can analyze it psycho-acoustically and acoustically ...

We are what we experience together, there is no absolute inaccessible material or sensible reality OUTSIDE , there is only only relatively inaccessible levels ;it is consciousness itself on his many layered levels...But they are all synchronized and manifest each one as different consciousness at different level...The core is ONE for ALL ...

Nobody had access to his own whole being to his own core save God ...Material reality is not the reflection of a head-set as claim Donald Hoffman, a Kantian too...Reality is a musically synchonized event...I like Cassirer who being more than just a mere Kantian add a Goethean perspective ... For Goethe there is no theory BEHIND the phenomena , there is no theory without the phenomena either , the phenomena are themselves the perspectival potential and manifested theory... The meaning and the sensible sign then are related through symbolic forms which are read as many possible synchronized perspectives ...This view is so deep... Husserl rediscovered it without refering to Goethe phenomenology, Henri Bortoft the physicist explain it for EVERYONE in few books...Read them...

The Infinite is scary because we cannot be outside of it, and we are held captive of it,if we dont recognize that we are it... We are chained by our own acts and we may free ourself by another act; this is why we need the act of thinking, the producted content on which we may focus to free ourself and be conscious of what we are doing...

This is the reason why the qualitative content of any sound must be created anew inside the listener perspective for example but it is also why the qualitative content of a sound reflect the vibrating body source qualities ( wood,metal, plastic , hard, soft, empty, full, and these qualities inform us about our relation with the world and ourself ...

We need air for the fire to awake, but the fire is not the air; we need air for the sound to travel but the air waves or their abstraction content  are not the sound experienced  qualities...

I will stop here...😁 And i apologize for being a bit too much... 😊

@snilf 

Super real will do I suppose. In the case of the system I mentioned, very pretty, but not realistic. Female voices and violins are not sibilant in person. Drummers do not set up their kit so the cymbals are 10 feet in front of the snare. 

Obviously, this takes a proper live recording. I find it amusing that engineers of yor  do a better job of getting this right. 

This system is not beyond help at all. Just a steady roll off from 1 kHz at 1 dB/oct would result is less super-realism, but more accurate sound.  Because this system is point source, images will alway be smaller, as if you are seated in the back of the venue. The system has very accurate bass down to about 50 Hz where it starts to lose power. He really needs two 15" subwoofers, another rabbit hole. 

Sounding correct in terms of timbre is relatively easy. It is just a matter of correct amplitude response given a loudspeaker with a well designed crossover and phase response.  Casting an image is the hard part. You can't know what you are missing until you experience it. It was about 10 years as an audiophile until I heard a system image correctly and another 10 before I could reliably replicate it. 

In short, IMHO, it does not have to be perfectly accurate, it just has to be convincing.