I reject you premise for I don't believe there is a threshold for musical enjoyment. In any given day, I spend 40- 50% of my music listening time in my car (a stock Ford audio system) and I cannot say that my enjoyment of the music is any less than my serious living room system. I have a total of 3 music oriented system in my home. They are of varying quality and my attention to setup and room interactions for each system ranges from precise to "I don't care". Yet, I am able to enjoy, at a very deep level, music on any of these systems. Great music can make all issues regarding sound quality irrelevant.
Musical threshold event
This thread is related to several others concerning being an Audiophile versus a music lover....but a shade different. From my own personnal experience and from conversations I've had with others, as a person is building their system, there seems to be a threshold beyond which the beauty of the music suddenly grabs your attention instead of the beauty of the sound. After that threshold is crossed, the music is front and center. Recordings are listened ALL the way thru and there is less pre-disposition to mess around with the equipment, perhaps, in part, out of fear of loosing the magic. For me this happened when I got a pair of Forte 4s to drive my Martin Logan Quests. The music grabbed my attention instead of the sound (which was also quite good). All of my equipment purchases past that point have been in pursuit of the musical experience. Sound quality matters, but compliments, instead of dominates my equipment selections. I'd like to know at what points all of you crossed that threshold and what combination of equipment got you there. Contrasting that threshold point for vinyl and digital would be neat too.