I was listening to a tape of her playing the Bartok Viola concerto. There is a picture of her on the CD and she looks like a normal sized chinese lady. It struck me that William Primrose`s comments in his part of the Yehudi Menuhin Guide to violin/viola to the effect that women`s fingers aren`t stubby enough to play the viola may be a little hard to sustain if Hong Mei Xiao has normal sized hands. She is the only viola player to win the Geneva International Music competition for donkey`s years, and that presumably is open to male viola players as well!

also- does anyone know what size viola she plays? If it`s less than 16 1/2 inches that crumples another of Primrose`s theories.