There's nothing wrong with the word lady, as long as it's used alongside gentleman. Otherwise I think it should be men and women. I've never understood why Wimbledon has ladies' and men's competitions. And, with all respect to Simon, I'm never keen on the "it's the way I was brought up" argument. It's akin to saying: "disagree with me and you insult my mother".

I agree Tony and "ladies" in this context suggests amateurism as well,  like there used to be "gentleman" cricketers (who were often paid  -under the counter - and sometimes far from gentlemanly )

Being too politically correct is fraught with danger.  You'd expect "woman and man" from any official source but in many parts of the country it's "lads and lasses" up to middle age. Visting my "ancestral" county in my late teens, I was greeted by a matronly but attractive 40 ish shopkeeper with "Can I 'elp you, my luverr?" Didn't offend me at all!

That reminds me of when I was about six years old and we had gone to visit my brother who was living in the wilds of somewhere. We went into the local shop and a woman bent down to me and enquired `And how are you, me duck?`. Hugely indignant, I ran to inform my mother of this terrible insult - `That woman called me a duck!`. Never did understand why she didn`t take her to task over it ....

Sorry, off topic. It wasn`t even a violin shop!

The breast size question is (I'm sorry to disappoint anyone here who might be hoping otherwise) of no obvious contextual relevance or pertinence whatsoever in this case, since the violinist was one Erich Gruenberg