# Live Recordings or Studio - what do you prefer?



## ladyrebecca (Mar 19, 2009)

Do you have a general preference for whether you enjoy live or studio recordings? It's got to be weird to perform in an empty concert hall when they do that for recordings ....

Obviously, the quality of the group and performance are paramount, but have you noticed any bias in your recorded listening preferences?


----------



## JTech82 (Feb 6, 2009)

ladyrebecca said:


> Do you have a general preference for whether you enjoy live or studio recordings? It's got to be weird to perform in an empty concert hall when they do that for recordings ....
> 
> Obviously, the quality of the group and performance are paramount, but have you noticed any bias in your recorded listening preferences?


Some live recordings sound great and some of them don't. It all depends on the way it was recorded.


----------



## World Violist (May 31, 2007)

I nearly always prefer live performance recordings. The sound might be terrible, people might be coughing and whatnot... it rarely matters much to me, as long as it is musical and as long as it is GOOD music. Much of the time live recordings are more emotional intense than are studio recordings.

Studio recordings sometimes have a tendency to be too micromanaged, also. Live recordings are far more immediate, so warts and all I like them.


----------



## Edmond-Dantes (Mar 20, 2009)

Lol. Well put WorldViolinist.

I especially love live recordings when I have the dvd of the performance as well. That way, I always get to picture the event while I listen to the cd later. ^-^;;


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I don't mind live recordings at all. Even the odd cough seems to give them a bit of atmosphere. I have a few live recordings in my collection, but most of them have the clapping edited out at the end. I don't like how they do this. The clapping gives finality to the performance and also gives alot of atmosphere.

I know this is digressing, but you can't go past good live performances of the great jazz artists, like Louis Armstrong in particular. He was a great showman, and as Edmond-Dantes says above, listening to the recording you can kind of picture the event while you are listening. Especially when the audience are clapping along to him singing a tune. It kind of crystallizes a moment in history.


----------



## Edmond-Dantes (Mar 20, 2009)

OH YES. I definitely agree about the jazz thing. My favorite recordings were of Miles Davis.. You really could see the emotion he had. (Probably a bit of drugs as well, but still... ) XD


----------



## Elgarian (Jul 30, 2008)

I've never been able to pin down any hard-and-fast rule. A fine performance made in the studio can be so fine that I have no actual awareness of the way it's been made, and don't even think about it. On the other hand I don't mind the occasional cough or snuffle in a live performance - my favourite recording of Elgar's 1st symphony was made live, at the Proms under Boult in his last year. And if it's something like Bohm's live _Ring_, for instance, there's a distinct electricity in the air that catches me up in the music. Which reminds me - like Andre, I do rather like the applause at the end of an act, in an opera; the silence at the end of a studio performance always seems oddly ungrateful...


----------



## nickgray (Sep 28, 2008)

I don't have any particular preference. Sometimes live recordings may include a tb audience, sometimes studio recordings are done bad. But mostly (well, not that mostly, but yeah, mostly) both are done quite good and it all comes to a preference.


----------



## ladyrebecca (Mar 19, 2009)

So many great points. My primary musical preference is jazz, so I appreciate the moment-in-time live recording. I think a live audience spawns creativity that may otherwise manifest itself in a less interesting form (in, say, a studio). It's cool how every take is different. It's always fun to hear studio outtakes of pieces I think I know very well, because it often adds something new to the experience. 

On the Miles Davis Complete Plugged Nickel recordings, I *love* hearing the old cash register chiming in the background. It's also become an additional instrument. And there's this one guy who yells out, "Yeeeeaaaahh Miiiiles" during the clapping. Always makes me smile. 

I love hearing the coughing chorus between movements of live recordings because they remind me of being at the symphony. And Elgarian, you're right too that there are some absolutely fine and moving studio performances. I often feel like clapping after hearing certain studio recordings of the Emerson String Quartet doing Brahms.


----------



## EarlyCuyler (Mar 28, 2009)

Live, without a doubt. There is much less chance of an Engineer playing with levels during a piece this way. Nothing I hate more than when some dips#@t producer decides to cut the brass back during a big tutti section. Thats whay I used to love Telarc recordings so much, but now, even they are starting to fiddle around too much. I've been listening to the recent Cincinnati Symphony/Jarvi Shostakovich 10, and I was at the concert where it was recorded, and it sounded much better in the abysmal venue that is Music Hall, than it does on the recording. Quite honestly whats wrong with placing a mic in the back of the hall, with another for backup of course, and letting the natural sound of the orchestra out. DG uses so many microphone's its RIDICULOUS. It creates an unnatural balance to the sound of a piece of music.


----------



## ecg_fa (Nov 10, 2008)

For me too, it depends. In general despite some artificiality I prefer studio recordings.
But-- some artists like Marta Argerich for example I really enjoy live. And there're
many others I really like live. I agree that miking can make a difference and sometimes
the balance/sound on live recordings doesn't sound too great-- but this has improved
overall in recent years it seems to me.

As for jazz-- I too love a lot of live recordings which have a lot of emotional punch and add
'working without a net' immediacy to the improv which I like a lot. Esp. Miles Davis and
John Coltrane live sets-- but others too like Dave Brubeck Quartet's 'Live at Carnegie Hall.'

Ed


----------



## blays (Apr 19, 2009)

It does just come down to preference.
For me, if it's a live recording, then I'd like to be able to visualize it, so DVD's of the performance are best. Otherwise a studio recording generally gives more clarity to the music, and isn't too muffled up with other noises coming and going from a concert hall. I still remember hearing a live recording of some Transcendental Etudes by Liszt and Moments Musicauxby Rachmaninoff played by <can't remember> almost a decade ago, and it was awful; but it might have been just bad luck.
In general Deutsche Grammophon makes pretty solid studio recordings, I find.


----------



## Edmond-Dantes (Mar 20, 2009)

EarlyCuyler said:


> Live, without a doubt. There is much less chance of an Engineer playing with levels during a piece this way. Nothing I hate more than when some dips#@t producer decides to cut the brass back during a big tutti section. Thats whay I used to love Telarc recordings so much, but now, even they are starting to fiddle around too much. I've been listening to the recent Cincinnati Symphony/Jarvi Shostakovich 10, and I was at the concert where it was recorded, and it sounded much better in the abysmal venue that is Music Hall, than it does on the recording. Quite honestly whats wrong with placing a mic in the back of the hall, with another for backup of course, and letting the natural sound of the orchestra out. DG uses so many microphone's its RIDICULOUS. It creates an unnatural balance to the sound of a piece of music.


 I wholeheartedly agree. I like to hear the emotion of the symphony, not the engineer.


----------



## handlebar (Mar 19, 2009)

JTech82 said:


> Some live recordings sound great and some of them don't. It all depends on the way it was recorded.


Ditto. I have some tremendous live recordings and some real duds.
I prefer an audience as to empty halls. The acoustics are better to my ears and the interaction of a few coughs,etc seem to add to the music.

Jim


----------

