Quote from Gustav Mahler

[Wunderhorn]

'...When I want to produce a soft, restrained sound, I don't give it to instruments which can produce it easily, but to one which can produce it only with effort, reluctantly, indeed often only by forcing and going beyond its natural limits. So I often make the double basses and the bassoon squeak out the highest notes, while the flutes are puffing away deep down below...' -- Gustav Mahler