[organsnyder]

I'm an organist. The organ console is often placed quite some distance from the pipes—especially in the instance of remote divisions such as antiphonal stops (placed at the back of the sanctuary). In addition to distance, the mechanism of the instrument itself introduces a bit of lag. It's something that you just get used to. Choral and orchestral musicians also often deal with these sorts of issues: sometimes they have to play entirely on sight (watching the conductor's baton) rather than listening to the (delayed) sound.

I used to play Dance Dance Revolution quite regularly. One of our controllers had a lag that made it unplayable for most people. But I found my brain adjusting to it extremely quickly, and I think it's because I was accustomed to doing that already during organ playing.

[atomack]

Somehow the audience also manages to adjust too, trained or not. The violins and cellos are several metres apart yet I think the audience would agree whether they come off together or not, regardless of where they're sitting in the auditorium

I wonder if actually it's the delays plus reverb we manage to adjust to. I remember playing church organ too, a while back, and I found the delays much easier to get used to than say a 4 or 5 ms delay in a DAW, even though the delay was probably much bigger. It's like it's training + room acoustics that we use to adjust, rather than the raw numbers of the physical delay

[xahrepap]

My wife is a musician and sang in a highschool/college choir. She hated when they combined with the orchestra and the orchestra conductor conducted a song. Said it felt like the conductor was off a bit because he compensates for different delays.