From what I have seen, but this is only by observation and discussions and not any study or research (disclaimor), most congregations have made the switch to ELW.
Many people complain that there are too many liturgies. From the perspective of a single congregation actually using them all that is correct, but it does allow for more options at least. Although personally I still think the carryovers from LBW were by far the best. But the inclusion of the spanish liturgy some really appreciate as well as the hymnic liturgy, that is a setting that was designed for congregations that struggle with the liturgy, so much of the liturgy has been set to familiar hymn tunes. My wife for example, who was not raised in the liturgical tradition really appreciates this and I think it was a good idea because the reality is that you cannot expect every Lutheran to be musical or have experience with the liturgy which to some is a very intimidating thing about Lutheranism and does not encourage the participation of the full congregation. For more experienced Lutherans and musical congregations, this setting is not popular (naturally).
I think one of the things where a lot of ELW's negative feedback comes from is that the hymnal for many became exposure to some of the far liberals of the ELCA. This comes in the decision to remove some classic hymns because of its allusions to Christians as soldiers in a war, or the altering of texts to make them more gender neutral or modern vocabulary (thank God they did not do that to all texts, it would be a shame to see all of Catherine Winkworth's great translating dumbed down a bit).
The other thing is that ELW has A LOT of new material from LBW. If you had been keeping up with all the little songbooks that had been released through the years there would not be a whole lot of extra material from what came from LBW+those, but the strictly LBW congregations saw a lot of new stuff, which could be good except to make room some old stuff had to go and everywhere everyone lost at least one favorite it seems. The other thing is that the hymnal was quite aware that Lutherans were not just european ancestry anymore, and many more hymns of other ethnic traditions were added. For communities such as my own that are either diverse or able to use this greater repritoir of music this became a great strength of the hymnal, but for parishes that are still german, norwegian, swedish for the most part and unable to really sing music of a different style, this makes a good portion of the hymnal unusable to them, and they often find that most of what the use was really what came over from LBW, in which case the ELW did not aid them as much. The other thing is I think that the hymnal would also be unusable for a church of any single ethnic background if it is rather bound to the music of their ethnic tradition because there are only so many african spirituals and asian pieces to support such congregations. Really, I think the hymnal does not work well if you want to stick to only one style of hymnody. But for those who can and do embrace the musical diversity they see it as a rich resource for Sunday mornings.
I think it was great to include the catechism in the hymnal. But I also think that is one of the most untapped resources of the ELW. It makes it a greater tool for in the home, but could also be used on Sundays.
They put in some good sections on explaining layouts of liturgy, both in the front and their "liturgy is biblical" section in the back, which is good since the church at large is starting to more and more adapt an anti-liturgical nature. But I think they could have put more in there (although I was pleased for its presence at all). Much of the language of the liturgical structure such as the words used for the basic outline of the divine service Gathering, Word, Meal, Sending comes from the influence of Gordon Lathrop, who along with Lorraine Brugh wrote a fine book on the ELW and using it in congregations entitled "The Sunday Assembly".
I was disappointed that nowhere does it include the Athenasian Creed. It does not forbid it, but I really think it still shows some favor to those who do not appreciate the creed. After all, we just had Holy Trinity Sunday!
Some of the smaller services have had some more major revisions done, for better or for worse such as the marriage section.
Some did not like the fact that many of the hymns no longer have all four harmonies included in the pew edition. This was done to my understanding because many of those arrangements were not supposed to be sung in harmondy or were better suited for unison. But I could be wrong. It does make it so that if you like to play the hymns at home you could only play melodies on many if you have the pew edition though. If you are a musician, the accompaniment editions (yes, plural) are very in depth as to how the music should be played stylistically (since there are so many new hymns) and they have editions for pianists as well as organists and the appropriate markings and such for guitars if that is what your church leads with. ALthough some musicians have vented over the cost of getting all the editions, and the organist edition now has been split into two volumes because the original was so large they had issues with the seems not holding up.
Overall, where I have been, particularly in the city churches, the hymnal has gotten a positive reception. But those of us who talk about it usually raise its various kinks and problems that come as you can see mostly out of the fact that the hymnal was designed to accomodate a body of congregations that are theologically, ethnically, and musically diverse people and many might not have been exposed to that diversity first hand until they picked up this hymnal.
Probably said way more than you needed to read.
Pax
