Soundstaging and imaging are audiophile fictions.

Any animal's ear (including a human's) should have no trouble to very accurately identify the direction and distance of sounds. It's survival.

One thing that hasn't been clearly stated is that for an acoustic performance (e.g., orchestral) the microphones are usually placed closer to the performers than the vast majority of the audience. By being closer to the microphones the relative distances of the individual performers to the microphones is greater thereby emphasizing (exagerating?) the depth and width. My experience at the symphony is width and depth are there but not near as prominent as on recordings. While this is a nice effect, I think getting tonality correct is the real secret to a good audio system.

Tastes great; less filling.

Maryann or Ginger.

Bose 901's

Comparisons to live music are subjective but should be looked at as objectively as possible. Amplified music at a live event usually comes across as mono. Unamplified music has a soundstage depending upon where the listener sits. Sit far enough away from your two channel home speakers and they will be perceived as mono.

Some of the best recordings I have heard are mono. Early audiophiles thought stereo was a gimmic and many of the early stereo pressings supported that notion by the album title.

I enjoy a good stereo image and stage depth but other aspects are more important to me. It's just this man's opinion but I'd rather listen to music that has staying power than continually search for sounds that shows off my system. It's wonderful when everything is right though.

Jeffrey, it is true what you state and sometimes it is not. If you have a hall with much reverb, you will find it hard to pinpoint a particular instrument playing, say in a string quartett if you close your eyes, with eyes open however, your ears, brain will make the particular instrument snap into focus, what a good setup can simulate quite well, interestingly enough even better, if you listen with your eyes closed. The subjective effect is almost the same, if you've set up your rig intelligently, only there are different senses involved.
Pin point imaging, and there I fully agree with you,is something invented by audiophiles who I suspect, have little or no experience with live music. If I meet up with those sharply delineated images (mostly without depth ) in a system, I find it disturbing and it causes listening fatigue as far as my ears are concerned. In a live event the sound will emanate from an instrument in every enlarging circles, it will bloom forth, not from a tiny point in space ,but , say from the wooden body of a guitar which will react to the strings being plugged. This bloom to my mind, a highly complex waveform, epecially with many instruments playing, is heavily emaciated by redbook CD, which instead will deliver "pinpoint" musical inaccuracy. The music does not "breathe". I love stators, because to my ears, they bring the closest aproximation to "bloom", are fast enough to bring forth a fair facsimile of those subtle dynamic and tonal changes, which a chord struck, say on Steinway Grand will propell into its surounding air. So bacically, I agree with Duke's post,no small wonder, the man loves stators as well!