When Gao Hong joined a traveling music troupe as a prodigious child, her fellow Chinese musicians called her “little black kitten”. This name was engendered by the state in which her friends found her each morning, covered in soot from hours of practicing in the furnace room, the sole place she could use without waking her colleagues. Today, Gao Hong receives widespread acclaim as both a pipa player and composer. She has performed at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Smithsonian, and countless other venues throughout Europe, Australia, Japan, China, and the United States, and has been featured in over 100 newspaper articles and four TV documentaries in the United States alone. Gao Hong also has earned a reputation as an enthusiastic educator. In addition to giving hundreds of workshops to elementary school students, Gao Hong frequently serves as a guest lecturer at colleges and universities throughout the United States.