Is "live" music sound possible for under $1K

Given you listening preferences (mine include the genres you note as well), I might suggest you consider something like:

Maggie MMGs - $400 used
Jolida 1501 integrated - $500 used
Signal Cable i/c's - $20 used
Signal Cable biwire speaker cables - $65 used

This gets you a starter system for $985, but doesn't include shipping.

Your price point makes it difficult (for me, at least) to suggest anything more. I would think the above will give you a taste for what "better than Good Guys" upstream and planar speakers can do for piano, chamber and opera (vs. box speakers).

As a Von Schweikert-to-Maggie 3.5r convert, I'm a strong advocate of planars for the type of music you mention. Hope this gives you some food for thought.

Tim

Because you are willing to start at "ground zero" except for your source, I might suggest you spend some time auditioning what's out there. You have a lot of things already nailed down - your listening room, your source, and the music you prefer. But your system will coalesce as a result of the interaction of the components as much as the components themselves, and you should try to get an idea before purchase what that might end up to be...unless you really like surprises (both good and bad).

When I started at "ground zero" I was astounded how many choices were actually out there - and the not-so-subtle differences supposed similar technologies yielded. Only your ears can tell you if, for instance, a Bottlehead Foreplay floats your boat with your source and your music...and it may not float your boat with one set of speakers vs. another.

The great thing is once you nail down your preferences to at least the fingers on one hand (which is partially decided for you by budget constraints), you can go nuts like the rest of us looking for your choices to come up for sale here on Audiogon ;)

We can all only speak from personal experience, my experience had me first thinking I was going to go tube preamp, monoblocks, Maggie 3.6's and had not experienced the differences cable can make (so wasn't considering this in the budget at all).

The reality is that I went Plinius integrated, Maggie 3.5's, bought a whole new analog rig, power cord and am experimenting with different cables.

And as a performing musician, going to see more live music is really my first recommendation too.