The theme music for the UK crime mystery series, Jonathan Creek, this music can also be heard in the movie Shrek The Third, as well as in Mickey Mouse's House of Villians (2002).
Danse Macabre is a tone poem for orchestra, written in 1874.It started out in 1872 as an art song for voice and piano with a French text by the poet Henri Cazalis, based on an old French superstition. Later the composer expanded and reworked the piece into a tone poem, replacing the vocal line with a solo violin part. According to legend, Death appears at midnight every year on Halloween. Death calls forth the dead from their graves to dance for him while he plays his fiddle. His skeletons dance for him until the rooster crows at dawn, when they must return to their graves until the next year.When first performed it was not well received and caused widespread feelings of anxiety. Today, it is considered one of Saint-Saëns' masterpieces, widely regarded and reproduced in both high and popular culture. The music can be heard in the movie Shrek The Third, as well as in Mickey Mouse's House of Villians (2002) and the theme music for the UK crime mystery series, Jonathan Creek.
