What do you care about most when listening to music?

[coykiesaol]

For me , I care the sound effect most , either earphones or acoustics............I like enjoy my music in a perfect way...........

how about you?

talk freely

[gryphon]

When I am listening to music there are several areas that are important:

• The first is the hardest to define : to me there has to be some heart and soul in the music for me to think it is worth listening to.
  

• Like several people on this forum I like to hear the music as close to the way that the person making and recording it wanted me to. They put a lot of effort into getting the music to sound the way they wanted it to be heard so I put a lot of effort into reversing that process.......So, I like to listen on a really good system.........I want to hear all the detail and I don't want anything added or removed.
  

• I like to hear the quality of the instrumentation.......for me the player spent time choosing the particular version of the instrument so I want to hear all about it........I want to hear the way the piano rings , to feel the reed in the instrument cut the air, to hear a good acoustic guitar ring to feel the slap of a bass drum.
  

• If there is a vocalist , I want to feel they are singing just for me and to experience their presence in the room.
  

• I want to know where they were singing or playing I want to hear the signature of the room on the acoustics.
  

• In addition , I like to hear the human aspect, the slight mistake, the wrong note, the edit the flaw
  

All this makes the listening experience for me

[CRAZY-HORSE]

i think youve summed it up perfectly Gryphon,

i like demo's and outtakes purely for the reason of hearing mistakes and out of tune vocals,duff notes etc. i also like the 'live' experience for the same flaws

[Music Head]

I guess it has to be the sound quality of how I am listening.
If that is poor I have no interest.

[CMB1888]

wow - I'm very much a lo-fi listener it seems - I don't really mind about the sound quality. I don't think it matters that much as long as it doesn't interfere with the essence of the song.

But that probably reflects on the type of music I listen to, tbh

[Tiggi]

Creativity is where it begins and ends for me. I like my music to sound impressive, but it's of no interest if there isn't something going on which excites and impresses.

The best of both worlds would be good music which sounds great, but I'll take the former over the latter.

[Jerome]

Dynamics. The music has to breathe - loud, quiet, fast, slow, bright, dim, sharp, soft. I do like the lavish productions but this is not essential. It must make me think as well as feel. If there are vocals they must make me think and the music make me feel. If it's instrumental the sound has to do both. I would think about why the composer chose a particualr instrument and why he drove the piece down a particular path.