These Canon HGXX cameras seem to be amongst the most popular hi-def cameras for recording live shows. Personally, as long as the camera is reasonably smallish, which this camera seems to be, I wouldn't worry about relative sizes because I think your technique will have a bigger factor in determining how successful you are at recording shows rather than camera size (assuming the camera isn't gigantic). I can't say for sure, but one thing I'd make double sure and be comfortable with is that the harddisc on this won't be prone to skips from bumps...I've heard that can be a nuisance for harddrive based video cameras. That might cause me to consider the non-harddrive based cameras a little more seriously.