Sat front row at the symphony...

viber6, you like the up close perspective. That is fine, more than fine, and I am not trying to convince you otherwise. Clearly we will not agree on this point. More specifically, on which approach serves the music best. “Chacun à son goût”!  In my opinion the music, as intended by the composer, gets priority. I will close with a few final comments to address yours:

To be clear, my example of bass clarinet/cello blend is but one example of many and of all that is going on in a large scale orchestral composition. That blend IS the detail, the new compositional detail. If we are to give composition theory as used by the great composers any credence it is really not a debatable point. This orchestration technique is far more than an “interesting synthesis” and is crucial to the composition. It is precisely what the composer wants to be heard. Not the individual instruments, but the blend. This serves the composition best. Soloistic passages by individual instruments obviously do get their turn. Perhaps this analogy will help to make the point:

I am sure you are familiar with the work of the French-pointillist artists. Stand very close to a painting by Georges Seurat and one sees a tremendous amount of the detail that is all the individual and different color paint dots (not strokes) that were his signature technique. However, the images, which are the “message”:of the painting are indistinct. Then, stand back some distance and it all comes together and reveals images full of beautiful colors and textures that his work is known for. This is akin to what we are discussing here.

I have witnessed and/or participated in countless examples of an orchestral musician (myself included) “auditioning” a new instrument, or instrumental accessory. To do so in a familiar hall as opposed to one’s home is crucial. It is a very common practice to do so on stage before rehearsals or during breaks from rehearsal and a colleague or two are recruited to assist in listening and offering opinions on what they hear. Without exception the listening assistant goes out into the house to listen. Never standing close to the player and his/her new piece of gear. Reason is that what is heard from a distance is what matters most. Acoustic sounds need a certain amount of travel distance to fully develop. Often, an instrument that may sound robust or brilliant up close simply doesn’t project that sound well. Conversely, an instrument that may sound compact up close can have tremendous projection. One of those interesting mysteries of sound production. Of course, as you know, how the instrument feels to the player has to be factored in when making a determination.

Anyway, good to discuss these points with you (and others) and regards.

@frogman ....+1..... the " playing " of the instruments, through the conductor's direction, is why I attend performances. I listen for the playing, through my rig, as well. My best. MrD

Ive found some music halls in New Orleans that me and my wife and perhaps I'll  bring my mother.  I kinda doubt the shows are as thrilling as what's up north but for our first time I believe it will be nice. I think my wife will be impressed, a great Mother's Day present. 

Have you been to Preservation Hall in New Orleans?  I was there in 2005, a few months before Hurricane Katrina.  Before going, I had visions of some big concert hall, but I laughed when I saw that it was the inside of a cave with walls of rocks.  Only 3 benches for about 20 listeners.  The hard surfaces of the rocks gave a bright, brilliant exciting sound to the brass jazz band and piano.  30 min of excitement for only $6.  Now it is about $40, still a great value.  Who needs large big name concert halls where most listeners pay big money to musically worship in these hyped temples for laid back, boring sound?  In NY, for sonic thrills I enjoy the subway for 1-2 min of close encounters with good platform musicians before the noisy trains arrive.  

frogman,

Your analogy of pointillistic artists actually makes my case, haha.  The semi-random points provide lots of detail at close viewing, but they don't make much sense until you move away and then can see what the real picture is.  The distant blend is the real message, but the details are lost, assuming you have normal visual acuity of 20/20 or so.  (But I have met some teenagers who have fantastic acuity of 20/10, so at 10 feet away where the normal vision people see only the whole, the teenager still sees the details of the small points, and he might need to move 20 feet away to appreciate the real message).  

My point is that the pointillistic artistic message is the blend, but it is not a detailed message.  We all enjoy the message, but it is a mistake to consider it as a DETAIL missing from the close viewing.  It's just a different message, not a detailed message.  I enjoy blends in other sensory forms, such as the unique ice cream blends you can create at Thomas Sweet in Princeton, NJ.  My favorite blend that I choose is sweet cream ice cream with malt balls and Reece's peanut butter cups, fully blended to fine particles in their machine.  They do it better than any other place.  It's an enjoyable blend, but the enjoyment doesn't derive from appreciation of details.  In contrast, a gourmet assortment of separate dishes of various meats, vegetables is best enjoyed tasting each item individually where all the details can be perceived.  Chinese dimsum is such an assortment of 10-20 small savory items, each enjoyed as a single entity.  It would be foolish to dump all the dimsum items together in a blended soup.  Yes, you might create an interesting hodge-podge blended taste, but it is smarter to enjoy the details of each item separately.

I love to hear some atmospheric distant orchestra recordings, such as in the Tchaikovsky Suite #3 in the 1973 EMI recording with Adrian Boult and the London Phllharmonic.  In one of the variations, the oboe shines above the soft entire string section.  (Or is it the English horn?  If the details were better captured with closer miking, I would have less doubt).  The recorded ambience is gorgeous.  This is a beautiful blend, but nothing thrills me more than to play in the orchestra close to many of the instruments.  I revel in the fine tone colors of different winds.  But from far away, the ambience, although beautiful, causes tonal smearing so that most of the delicate tone colors are markedly lost.

Your job as a pro is to please most of your paying customers, the audience, who mostly sit far away.  That's why you seek advice from your colleagues about how your instrument sounds 30-150 feet away.  The mass audience wants the blend, but they don't realize how much beauty there is in the details only heard close.

I haven't had much opportunity to enjoy a band of the sax family.  I might enjoy a performance from a distance, but I wouldn't learn as much than if I heard them close where the subtle differences in tonality would be better heard.  For a relatively quiet instrument like the violin, I need to be much closer to hear more of the differences between violins.  I could appreciate that for the much larger winds with more bass content, it would be important to sit further away to fully allow the blend to develop.  Let's say that the optimum distance might be 30 feet to get the ideal combination of detail and blend.  Moving to 60 feet would get more blend but sacrifice fine detail of tonal nuance.