Between live performance concert in big hall and listening recorded concert there is a difference always a changing one with no absolute superiority of one over the other in all case, for me...
It is true that a lived performance will always own a potential superiority for sure in principle because the musician spirit and body is in the room... A very small room concert is then the ONLY ideal way...Or playing ourself with this musician for sure.... 😊
But for a big hall concert it depend on many factors at play, location of the listener, crowds noise, acoustic properties of the room...
Glenn Gould prefered studio recording... I dont say he was right , i say he was not wrong either...
But for sure we can judge to a relative high degree a great pianist playing even from a bad recording...
We cannot assess the level of an artist only if we were "there" so to speak...
Our taste each one of us differ so much that for example i put here few months ago one of the greateast pianist perhaps i ever listened to and some criticized my choice saying they even cannot pick a reason why i admire him... 😊
Another example: i own albums of a tanbur Iranian musician, very badly recorded , which are among the most powerful musical performance i ever listened to, Yehudi Menuhin wrote and tought the same about him and to be frank i listen to this musician after reading Menuhin impressions... But for most people it will be only an horrendous recording and a not tamed music at all (persian origin) ... I know i test it with many music lovers, and they cannot understand why i loved it so much...
Any music must be learned so to speak and must be approached like we tame a wild unknown beast....
And at the end music is not only sound and is not even any more related to the musician body and spirit , it is a personal spiritual event that transcend even the musician personality and precise moment of the event...
Then there is one mountain peak yes, but many roads to musical illumination like in religious matter i think.... 😁😊😊😊😊😊😊
By the way, what i appeciate the more here, is the diversities of experiences and opinions, this is these diversities which is the door to new discoveries for me...
Like said frogman one day here, to tamper my always too great enthusiasm 😁 , there is no objective best of the best...
I will not dare to contradict him, because he is right for sure, especially if we take into account all opinions in the world...But for me there is, like for each one of you, the best of the best... It is normal and a testimony to our own different spirit journey...
Some musical event is like a first love, we cannot renounce it for the rest of our life...