Just found this game again - fond memories from the old Amiga days. However, the music is now some horrible sort of keyboard rubbish :( instead of the fantastic atmospheric mournful dirge, with a heartbeat if I remember correctly. How can I get the original sound?

Are you sure it isn't just inherently different between the Amiga and DOS versions?

You're probably right - just loved the sound for this game on the amiga......:(

Actually, I believe there may be ways to adjust the kinds of emulated sound in DOSBox (Adlib, Soundblaster, etc.)

I don't personally know how to do this, but I believe if you have the patience to read through this, http://www.dosbox.com/wiki/Sound, it may help you find a more acceptable solution.

The PC soundtrack is different from the Amiga one; I'm not sure what the GOG release configures by default, but it's possible to use the PC Speaker, Tandy 3-voice, Adlib and Roland MT-32 in the original release.

You can specify which to use during startup with commands like the following:

populous.exe vga speaker
populous.exe vga tandy (requires tandy=on in dosbox's speaker section)
populous.exe vga adlib
populous.exe vga roland

I remember these options being located somewhere in the manual, but I lost mine ages ago.

They all just play the same repetitive song on loop, however; It's probably best to just turn the music off (there's a button for it on the bottom part of the interface), and play something else in the background

For myself, I have to chime in that I, too, missed the music from the Amiga and ST versions. Missed more than that, though, are all the sound effects: the clash of swords during combat, the fanfare as a knight is created, the gooey slurping noise of a person dying in a swamp...by contrast, the emulated PC speaker bleeps from the DOS version are horrible.

I totally agree 100%. When I saw that GOG had this game I almost fell off my chair in my haste to buy it, I was so pleased. I'd spent an age in the early 90s playing this game on the miggy and couldn't wait to install it. Then came the major disappointment when I realised that it was not the Amiga version with all the cool music and sound effects. It was those that made the game great and for me the game is only a shadow of its former self without them. I actually can't bring myself to play it again :( Still I live in hope that one day the Amiga version will find its way onto GOG...