Text Box:  24. This is the composer, Camille (Ka meal) Saint-Saens (Saint-saw’) who was born in 1835, and died in 1921, at age 86. He is ranked by Goulding as the 27th greatest classical composer of all time. Saint-Saens was a friend of the most notorious spy of World War I, the dancer, Mata Hari, who was eventually executed by the French. The piece you heard on the CD came from his famous Carnival of Animals, written in 1886, but never permitted by him to be performed in his lifetime. He didn’t consider the work to be serious enough.. In it, Saint-Saens depicts the sounds of various animals, such as: hens and roosters, tortoises, mules, elephants…and even, kangaroos. The one you heard was from the 13th movement, the last, and called The Swan.