Camcorder to record Indoor Concert

Anyone have a suggestion about what camcorders are best to use to record
an indoor musical concert with singing and with the musical
instruments at the back of the stage from a lower balcony? Can the video
and the sound be reasonably good from that distance and, I assume the
camcorder will be able to zoom in on the people on the stage so you can
record their faces and movements and hear the music and singing as if
you were right on the stage yourself?

Also I would like the ability to transfer the audio and video to DVD in
different formats, to an iPhone or a memory stick.

Never owning one, I don't know if there are other important feature like
software that comes with the camcorder that I am unaware of or import
features built into the camcorder that are necessary to have an easy
experience recoding anything from stills, movement, and great audio and
video.

Thanks in advance,

B. Schneier

P.S. If there are better newsgroups for camcorders, would someone tell
me about any of them?

B. Schneier <> wrote:
> Anyone have a suggestion about what camcorders are best to use to record
> an indoor musical concert with singing and with the musical
> instruments at the back of the stage from a lower balcony? Can the video
> and the sound be reasonably good from that distance and, I assume the
> camcorder will be able to zoom in on the people on the stage so you can
> record their faces and movements and hear the music and singing as if
> you were right on the stage yourself?

> Also I would like the ability to transfer the audio and video to DVD in
> different formats, to an iPhone or a memory stick.

> Never owning one, I don't know if there are other important feature like
> software that comes with the camcorder that I am unaware of or import
> features built into the camcorder that are necessary to have an easy
> experience recoding anything from stills, movement, and great audio and
> video.

> Thanks in advance,

> B. Schneier

> P.S. If there are better newsgroups for camcorders, would someone tell
> me about any of them?

I don't have personal experience with this, but typically you do audio
and video separately, since one device is often only good at one
of the two. I know of people that use a MD (MiniDisk) rcorder for
audio in addition to a camcorder.

Arno