There are two types of music that compliment the fantasy role-playing game: Classical and Heavy Metal. Classical music has a wealth of fantastic material from Wagner's 'The Ring of the Nibelung' to Tchaikovsky's 'Sleeping Beauty' to Korsakov's 'Scheherazade'. Heavy Metal's repertiore, mostly from 70's and 80's metal, comes from bands such as Dio, Iron Maiden, and Queen.

When it comes to good backround music, I would recomend classical. Just like a good movie you want to have great sound floating through the air as the characters progress during the adventure. Unlike a movie it's hard to get just the right music playing at just the right moment. You want something fast and exciting when the battle commences. Unfortunately, battles on the tabletop often take up to a half-hour to enact and the typical allegro (fast section) only last a few minutes. It might be possible to repeat the music with a CD player, but then you lose the flow of the music and possibly the flow of the battle. The music would become an effect instead of a feeling.

What I suggest is getting ahold of full symphonies that contain exciting music throughout, like Beethoven's 5th, and just letting the whole thing play. Most full symphonies last anywhere from 20 to 50 minutes and would encompass the whole battle. Most battles have their ups and downs, and the music will pretty much follow this. Then you could put on other music during the calmer parts of the adventure. A good suggestion for this would be Mozart or one of those collections you see in advertisments.

Heavy metal as background music usually doesn't work that well unless you have a specific idea in mind. The reason being is that heavy metal has lyrics, and when players hear the music they will likely drift off and listen to them instead of paying attention to the adventure. So unless the lyrics pertain specifically to the adventure or are an active part of it, I would recomend sticking with a classical background.

On the other hand, some heavy metal is a great source of adventures. Rainbow's first three albums (with Ronnie James Dio on vocals and Ritchie Blackmore on guitar) have a number of 'story' type songs that can be trar~slated directly to an adventure. 'Snake Charmer' is about a man who comes to a village and causes general mayhem and havoc. It could be up to the PC's to rid the town of this menace. 'Temple of the King' is about one man's search for a hidden temple. We've all seen that before. There are two songs on the second album about a man tricked by a wizard into being his slave and working for many years before being mysteriously set free. Can the PC's find out why? There are many more.

Queen's second album, Queen 2, has great song material. There's battles with ogres, meetings with fairies, fighting against the forces of the black queen, and sailing the seven seas. Then there's Iron Maiden's 'Seventh Son of a Seventh Son', which is about a man who has the power of prophecy. The whole album is one story. That could be a whole campaign!

As stated before, Classical music has a wealth of material from which to choose. Many of the famous operas and compositions have a story which could be straight out of a fantasy novel. There really are a lot! Too many to list here. If you were to dig these treasures up you would have an endless amount of adventures to plague your players with. The only problem is that you really have to search for them. When you buy a tape or CD in the store, you'll be lucky to get more than just a general idea of what the story is behind the music; no details. To get the details for an adventure you would have to do some research, but believe me, with some of these stories, it's well worth it.

Jarrod's recommendations:

Classical background:

Time-Life's 100 Masterpieces
Time-Life's Treasury of Classics
Time-Life's Classical Thunder
Any Mozart.
Beethoven's symphonies (Battles)
Vivaldi's 'Four Seasons' (Battles)
Holst's 'The Planets' (Battles)

Classical story:

Tchaikovsky's 'Sleeping Beauty'
Wagner's 'The Ring of Nibelung'
Gounod's 'Faust'
Korsakov's 'Scheherazade'
There are many more!

Metal background: (probably just battles)

Rainbow-Blackmore's 'Difficult to Cure', the live version (an adaptation of Beethoven's 9th)
Metallica's 'And Justice For All'
Any Dream Theater

Metal Story:

Rainbow -- Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow
Rainbow -- Rainbow rising
Rainbow -- Long Live Rock n' Roll
Dio -- Holy Diver, The Last in Line, Sacred Heart
Rush -- 2112 (science fiction)
Iron Maiden -- Seventh Son of a Seventh Son
Black Sabbath -- various
King Diamond -- Abigail, Fatal Portrait, Them, Conspiracy, The Eye (horror and fantasy)

Write in to let me know about anything you find or if you tried any of these out.

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