In Reply to: Using live music as a reference?? posted by jazz1 on March 29, 2012 at 00:24:38:
I'd submit that it might be a reference of sorts if the recording you listen to is of a live performance you've heard of the same ensemble playing the same music in the same venue. Even that's a big "if," given the variables involved in mike selection and placement, mixing, dynamic compression, and other production decisions made by the recording team and artist as well as where you sat during the live performance. And that's not even factoring in the games that may be played by and with your acoustic memory.
Recordings are every bit as much artistic productions as the performances they replicate in our listening rooms. Some may induce the suspension of disbelief more and better than others, but to my ear--and heard on a variety of systems, multi- or two-channel--even the best of them don't get you quite to the "close" that counts only in horseshoes and hand grenades. They may sound "better" than live in many instances because of the conditions of the live venue, but they're not the same animal.
Jim
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Follow Ups
- RE: Using live music as a reference?? - Jim Treanor 10:28:50 03/29/12 (0)