Quote:And don't confound natural acoustics materials with electronic devices, good acoustic means that the room is build with the materials which let the sound optimally circulate, not stop it.

Reverberation is an effect of a specific room where sound is reflected many times from walls and returns to an ear with changed characteristics. You get absolutely the same effect while singing in a concrete chamber large enough (like church with high ceiling). This kind of reverb can be easily modulated by programming (and this is what the sound producer does). Putting the sound in a specific room is a necessary operation of sound mixing, it will not sound realistic otherwise. For chorals having a big reverb is necessary because they receive volume and strength that way. You may not even notice that, but it's a very important physics aspect of sound.

In this particular case of balalaika play, there is a guitar pickup and combo amplifier with a small reverb not changing with the pace of time (i.e. it's a modulated room which can easily exist in real life); the only questionable moment would be the actual quality of the combo amplifier and the fact if it adjusts the natural volume or not. Probably yes, it's just more practical that way because Fender (which was the host of that particular venue) is mainly an electric guitar manufactor, and electric guitars don't have natural acoustic amplification (internal reverb of the barrel).

Quote:It disturbs me to hear all those artificial vibratos and echoes.

Well, that's a pity, because all these touches can make the same notes sound pretty different if used wisely. It's like missing a whole dimension of music. For guitar, it's pretty much the same like the comparison of violin players recently discussed on HC: there are people who simply play notes and there are people who play music.