On Wed, 16 Feb 2011 01:22:41 -0800, KH wrote
(in article ):
On 2/15/2011 6:31 AM, Audio Empire wrote:
On Mon, 14 Feb 2011 17:57:38 -0800, ScottW wrote
(in ):
I've heard Pink Floyd live....I actually like the reproductions from
my system(s) much much better. Even going all the way back my Original
Large Advents.
It's not even close. Live is, IMO, sometimes overrated 
.
ScottW
I'm sorry, I cannot get past the notion that listening to a musical group
through loudspeakers (even any acoustical ones) is hearing that group
"live".
To me the only differences between hearing a PA system of a rock group and
listening to a recording of that group on one's own stereo system is the
quality of the loudspeakers and the fact that the concert is a "shared"
experience.
Well, there's more overlap than you seem to think, or you have a very
narrow definition of rock/pop. I don't believe any of the orchestras
accompanying groups such as Procol Harum or Renaissance, in their
orchestral shows, being amplified. And the "unplugged" MTV performance
of 10,000 Maniacs was IMO clearly their best work. The "Rule", no, but
there's a lot of hybrid stuff out there where maybe only vocals are
amplified (new age stuff like Nightnoise, Loreena McKennitt, for e.g.,
or folk for example), where the "pure" acoustic performances involved
are live by any reasonable definition.
Since I don't have any knowledge about "orchestras accompanying groups", I
obviously wasn't talking about that kind of concert. I was talking about the
type I've seen depicted that show rock groups on stage with fireworks, and
lots of microphones and PA speakers, I was in Rome a number of years ago at
the Roman Forum one Sunday afternoon. Paul McCartney was giving a concert at
the Colosseum and there were huge scaffolds with speakers on them lining the
street for more than half a mile. Even though I wasn't at the concert (I was
touring the Forum and the Palatine) I could hear the entire concert - it was
uncomfortably loud - even that far away. They must have a million Watts of
amplifier power. Nobody heard that concert un-amplified.
Perhaps you should change your description to "acoustic" music. Because
it's hard to dispute that musicians playing instruments right there in
front of you is not "live".
But what the audience hears is NOT the actual instruments playing, it's a
facsimile of the performance picked up by microphones, electronically
amplified and EQ'd, and heard via loudspeakers.
Have you ever walked down the street and passed an open doorway to a night
spot and heard a small band playing inside? Without even entering the
establishment, or even seeing inside, just hearing the music wafting through
the open door, something tells you "That's live music playing in there!"
Nothing can reproduce that sound. Were it the best stereo system in the world
in that club, you wouldn't be fooled into thinking it was real, live music
playing and The finest PA equipment isn't even THAT good!
But, clearly there's a broad gray line between what constitutes a
'concert' versus a 'performance event' where the music merely
accompanies the visual spectacle. Usually, when the folks on stage are
dressed in Halloween costumes, it's the latter :-) 'Course, that's just
my opinion.
Well, these bands are certainly a "performance event" and the musicians are
certainly playing their instruments "live", it's just that the audience isn't
hearing the direct, live sound of those instruments, but rather, as I said
earlier, a technically augmented facsimile thereof.