A 1984 fantasy series by Greg Bear.
Michael Perrin woke up one day and chose violence— er, we mean, he chose to figure out what the hell is a Song of Power, which leads him to an adventure and, yes, eventually violence when he's transported to another realm and meets the Sidhe.
Books in the series
- The Infinity Concerto
- The Serpent Mage
Tropes:
- Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: Numerous historical figures turn out to be gifted at magic. Artists, in particular, as they are prone of suffusing all sorts of magical effects into their masterpieces.
- Literary Work of Magic: All pieces of art ever created by humanity are magical, either through The Power of Rock or in an Art Initiates Life sense.
- Departure Means Death: Creatures from Earth brought into the Realm usually die after a short period of time.
- The Power of Rock: Any sufficiently great piece of music (or Art in general) has inherent magical properties. In particular, there's a piece called the Infinity Concerto which legendarily transported a group of people to another world; later in the book, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart improvises another piece to transport them all back.
