[Aerich]

If you want to up the XP you earn, just increase the difficulty level and/or rest endlessly on lvl 3 of Dragon's Eye (the one with Cold Wights).

The bard needs intelligence for the mage spells. Unlike IWD 2, a bard's ability to cast spells and the strength of the spells are not dependent on Cha. However, there's minimums on Int and Cha for bards, so you can't drop them down very much. Cha can be 15, with the rest put into Con. Don't forget, the maximum Con bonus to HP is +2, at Con 16. More is wasted except for warriors. You might also want the bard's Str to be 12 so you can use longbows (Str 15 is required for composite longbows).

You could give the F/D axes, but you wouldn't be able to use them after you dualed to druid. Not worth it; put the PP into spear or scimitar, maybe both.

And yes, bards do get more songs in HoW; they get songs every odd level (1st, 3rd, 5th, etc) up until 11th lvl, which gives an awesome combat song (damage resistance and regeneration).