I think it has to do with the music that he picked, Scheherazade by Rimsky-Korsakov. The music is based on the book One Thousand and One Nights (aka Arabian Nights). I think Evan is portraying the "mad king," Shahriar, who has come to mistrust all women and has beheaded a thousand of them (one every night after marrying them). Scheherazade eventually charms him with her continous stories that she leaves at a cliffhanger each night so that the king requests her to finish the next evening and so on.
The snakes are just part of "middle eastern" imagery that is often thought of by westerners (think Arabia-->Persia--->India--->snake charmers, cobras, etc). It's not culturally accurate, but it conveys the theme.