audience / spectators

The word audience comes from the Latin 'to hear'; the word spectator comes from the Latin 'to watch'.
If the group in attendance is there to see an event (sports, race, competition) spectator or audience would fit, as we use the words.
If the group in attendance is there to listen (concert, lecture, etc.) I would use audience only.

An audience is assembled for the explicit purpose of watching a show. Spectators are "bystanders" who just happened to be around when something interesting happened. So unless your magician is a street performer, we can assume he was performing for an audience. People who deliberately assemble to watch an event, such as a parade or a road race or a boat race on a river are usually called sp

So many performances these days are multi-media, so to speak ("the roar of the greasepaint, the smell of the crowd") we can't really limit ourselves to only one of the five senses. In popular music concerts the visual is almost as important as the aural - not to mention the smell of the marajuana! I often hear people say, We went to see a concert. And there's always been the opera and the ba