Just about every children's book in my local bookstore has an animal for its hero. But then only a few feet away in the cookbook section just about every cookbook includes recipes for cooking animals. Is there a more illuminating illustration of our paradoxical relationship with the nonhuman world?
It has to be able to play at the maximum expression and communication in every style and the only way you can do that is - like Verdi said - working with a file every day little by little until the orchestra's collective qualities emerge.