A very sad song in the key of B-flat major
Resistance bops, multicolored emotions, and yes, a little more "Driver's License"
Last week, while taking some time off after Pfizer #2, I was listening to a podcast about Olivia Rodrigo’s “Driver’s License” (because of course I was). One of the hosts said something that really stuck with me: “It’s a very sad song in the key of B-flat major.”
The band kids out there will know why this is interesting. Gross oversimplification: songs in major keys usually sound bright and optimistic, while songs in minor keys usually sound gloomy and a little mournful.
“Driver’s License,” as discussed in an earlier newsletter, is VERY SAD. It’s all about a breakup, and it doesn’t even try to reconcile the narrator’s feelings or suggest that everything will be okay in the end. But the song’s also performed in a major key, at a *solidly* allegro 144 bpm (the same tempo as “Happy” by Pharrell, as a point of reference).
If the feeling Rodrigo is evoking is basically yes I will wallow in these big sad emotions and no you cannot stop me, why not write the whole song in a minor key, at a slower tempo, and make it all...fit?
The answer has a lot to do with emotions, which is to say, it has a lot to do with effective storytelling.
Multicolored glass balls of memory
In Pixar’s Inside Out, all the action happens in protagonist Riley’s head, where her memories are stored in colored glass balls in a sort of bowling-ball-ramp situation.
When Riley’s a young kid, the balls come in one of five colors––yellow for joy, blue for sadness, red for anger, purple for fear, green for disgust. But as she gets older, the memories begin to come in more than one color at once. Some things are happy and sad. This initially disturbs the anthropomorphized emotions…until they begin to realize that this is just part of Riley growing up.
The film is all about this process: Riley’s emotions realizing that it’s not about Joy ruling everything, like it was when she was little. Instead, it turns out it’s the interplay between the emotions that adds meaning, purpose, and order to Riley’s life.
This is why art that can walk a line between happy and sad has the power to touch us so deeply and feel so real. Our metaphorical glass memory balls are all a multicolored mess. That’s just the human experience. And as humans, we can recognize when a storyteller’s being honest about this complexity, and when they’re trying to smooth it over in a way that feels false.
“I’m the random minor notes you hear in major songs”
This is one of my favorite lines from Janelle Monáe’s Grammy-nominated 2018 album, Dirty Computer. (Listen to the whole song, “I Like That,” here.) Besides being a clever line, it speaks to Monáe’s body of work in a really powerful way.
Just looking at Dirty Computer, Monáe crafted an album full of party bops that also addresses issues like sexism, racism, homophobia, police violence, socioeconomic inequality, and more. It makes you want to join the resistance. And makes you want to dance.
What’s the lesson for storytellers here?
Think about the medium you work in. And think about what your version of a very sad song in B-flat major might look like.
Where can you “zig” emotionally, when the audience expects a zag? How might you create tension between form and feeling? Where are the random minor notes in your major song––that is, the “consistent inconsistencies” (in the words of Jeff VanderMeer) that will make your protagonist’s emotional world feel real?
In Inside Out, it’s Joy and Sadness touching the core memories *together* that helps Riley grow into the next phase of her emotional life. In “Driver’s License,” it’s the juxtaposition of grief and the pulsing, pop-music hopefulness that gives the song its wistful intensity. The fact that the vehicle (uh, no pun intended) and the core mood don’t quite fit together is exactly what makes the song effective at capturing the ups––and downs––of first love.
In fact, Rodrigo achieved this so compellingly that SNL made a skit about a bunch of middle-aged men playing pool and belting out the bridge together while they cried about their exes.
In the words of Kate McKinnon as the old guy in the corner, “I got my driver’s license 55 years ago. Why is this hitting me so hard?”
Happy storytelling, all. <3
–Erin
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Erin Becker (she/her)
Writer | Communications Consultant | Storytelling Expert
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