Any suggestions and composers who are really popular out there that goes with adventuring like in D & D?
If you are looking for some music to actually
use while playing D&D, I strongly suggest you to differentiate across different phases of the game... For some reason a lot of DM just think that putting on some epic movie soundtrack during the whole game is cool, but personally I find it extremely annoying as it often makes it difficult to concentrate when it matters, and it also works against narrative immersion.
I use
Spotify when running the game, and I switch between different playlists I created myself. You'd better have an actual subscription rather than the free version however, otherwise the commercials can easily break the mood.
On the top of my head, I think I have the following separate playlists:
(out of game)
- A general fantasy-themed playlist that I use only
before the actual game starts, to set the general mood, and then afterwards or whenever we take a break: in other words, only when we're dealing with OOC moments such as character creation, levelling up, making table arrangements, etc... This list includes mostly classic rock music tending to the progressive such as Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull, Yes, Queen, King Crimson, Genesis, Deep Purple, Rush, Uriah Heep, Thin Lizzy and a few more.
(during the game)
- Overland narrative including wilderness or city exploration, average social interactions, travelling, shopping and other activities during which the characters are engaged but not particularly under threat. Moderately relaxing music such as new age and ambient, mostly instrumentals: main examples are classical music, Mike Oldfield, Brian Eno and Ennio Morricone.
- Dungeon exploration. This is my favourite playlist, for which I specifically selected tense and scary songs from a variety of sources. Some examples are King Diamond and Goblins, as well as again Brian Eno, but you can easily find great picks from horror movies soundtracks. The key is however to avoid songs with a rhythmic section (so no heavy metal here).
- Battles. The easiest of the bunch, almost any epic/historic/war movies soundtrack works here, with Vangelis being my favourite, also Audiomachine. Contrary to the previous lists, this mostly features songs with a steady rhythm to give a sense of ongoing action and constant danger, neither too slow nor too fast.
- Taverns and important social interactions get their own list of vaguely medieval-sounding acoustic themes. I like using Segovia classical guitar music, Penguin Café Orchestra and some old Enya.
- Temples and holy places also get their own list, although this is by far the least used of the bunch. Enya and gregorian chants work best for these.