Live or Recorded; A Faustian response

Well put, sir! You could add to that my wife's (off-key) singing to the Gilbert & Sullivan Songbook record I got from Sdcampbell--thanks, SD, it's been a lot of fun!

Another great post, we seem to be getting a few of them recently! Having just performed the Lord Nelson Mass in our choir's spring concert, I must say that nothing will quite drain me emotionally as much as a live concert, both as a performer and as a member of the audience. I do appreciate the ability to have the greatest artists in my listening room at a moment's notice, and I am moved emotionally by it, but never quite to the extent as at a live musical event. There's an electricity, an edge, that you just don't get from a recording, especially a studio recording (probably why I like recordings from concert performances), and on big pieces, where real life impact and power are involved (I have never heard a recording capture the visceral power of the bass drum at the end of the Shostakovich 5th or the beauty and majesty of final portion of the Mahler 2nd) there is no contest, no matter how good your system.

Plsl: I'm sneaking out on Friday to catch their matinee, if I can. In my view, the VPO owns almost any piece they choose to play. Heard them in Vienna last June playing the Strauss Alpine Symphony with Janssons conducting--no stereo system in the world can reproduce that experience. How was Haitink with them?

In Schubertmaniac's and my posts we were referring principally to non-professionals whom we care about performing, or at least that's how I'm looking at it. I agree that I wouldn't want to attend performances by professionals who were merely going through the motions or performances of works I'm not interested in (although I'm always willing to give unknown pieces a listen), but my son's first elementary school concert was a priceless musical moment I'll always treasure.