As a symphonic poem, 'Danse Macabre' was elaborated (in 1874) from Saint-Saëns' earlier song-setting of a poem by Henri Cazalis - a sort of French Tom O'Shanter without the chase, in which the devil, playing a mistuned fiddle, conjures skeletons from thei r graves at midnight into a macabre dance. Saint-Saëns' orchestral version was the first orchestral score to use a xylophone, in a tune that he later recycled for "Fossils" in 'Carnaval des animaux". Roy Howat