Introduction

We'll explore concepts further in separate topics and link them here, if you’re feeling unfamiliar with certain ideas. For now, this topic is focused on analysing examples for personal use and understanding.

What is key?

In summary, key is:

• what notes feel like the default ones in a musical piece
• "what feels like home"
• the root note is the anchor that all other notes gravitate towards, for resolving melodies and harmonies

Minor keys often sound more serious, and major keys are more jovial.

What is the key associated with?

It sets the musical landscape for a song — similar to whichever colours you may choose for a visual piece.

When analysing keys and key changes, the root note of the first key itself doesn’t matter so much. What matters is the relative distance between that and the new key, as well as what notes are shared between the new key and the previous. This is important for transitions.

Key changes within songs

Within a song, a key change can reflect a change in a character's mindset, or reinforce strength and inject a degree of energy. This is very common in power ballads. Examples of key changes within songs, from movies, include songs from the 3D animated films Lego Movie 2 & Frozen.

Lego Movie 2

• Everything's Not Awesome from Lego Movie 2

  • it starts slow to reflect the dejection of the characters, as expressed in the lyrics. The starting key is C major (the original Everything is Awesome is in a major key)

  • it then steps up two tones to E major a bit later on, to reflect the more upbeat mindset of the characters, corresponding to the lyrics

[Chorus 1 - C major]

Everything's not awesome

Everything's not cool // I am so depressed

Everything's not awesome

I think I finally get Radiohead

[Chorus 3 - C major]

Everything's not awesome

Things can't be awesome all of the time

It's unrealistic expectations

But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try... [transition]

[Chorus 4 - E major]

...to make everything awesome

In a less idealistic kind of way

We should maybe aim for not bad

'Cause not bad right now would be real great

• Love is an Open Door from Frozen — it steps upwards from D major to E major about halfway, to reflect the growing synergy between characters Hans and Anna and their apparent optimism in the relationship

Examples for key changes across tracks

Random Access Memories

Daft Punk was an electronic music duo, and their Random Access Memories album features a number of collaborations with other musicians, including Chilly Gonzales who talked about the key in the album's fourth song Within. (The most widely-known song in that album is Get Lucky featuring singer Pharrell Williams and guitarist Nile Rodgers.)

The first three tracks in the album are in A minor. Daft Punk reached out to Chilly Gonzales to write a song that would transition from A minor to B♭, since a number of songs after that are in either B♭major or B♭minor (Instant Crush, Lose Yourself to Dance).

Within fills that role, having an intro section that plays in A minor, then transitions. The rest of the song is in B♭ minor, paving the way for subsequent songs. This makes for a smooth listening experience when you have the album's songs playing in order.

(A set of songs after those are in B major/minor — Touch, Get Lucky, Beyond. Then another chromatic step again up to C for Motherboard, Fragments of Time)

The composer/piano player for Within described himself as like an actor and Daft Punk as directors. The key can be an element that is explored to support your game’s narrative.

Sonic the Hedgehog 3

Sonic 3 follows other Sonic games in having multi-act levels. A number of songs in this game have different tracks for Act 1 and Act 2 of a level, to reflect some progression.

The first level, Angel Island, is a floating tropical paradise island. In Angel Island Act 1, the music is in C major, to capture this upbeat feeling. In Angel Island Act 2, where the island is on fire, the music is switched to the C minor key, to reflect the more sombre mood. There are notes kept between the keys for coherence, so that the juxtaposition is not so harsh and the tunes for both acts are still recognisable as being Angel Island.

Alex Yard explains in his music theory video:

Now the big thematic contrast between the two acts of Angel Island is that Act 1 is a peaceful welcoming idyllic island, whereas Act 2 is a firestorm of chaos that sets the game's conflict into motion. From a music theory standpoint, the composer used the go-to method for expressing this good/bad contrast: Act 1's major key equals happy, while Act 2's minor key equals serious.

Perhaps this night and day contrast was so obvious that the composer decided to tone down the way this was expressed in the melody scales. The major sixth and minor seventh notes serve as a sort of constant, staying the same between both acts. But it’s the third scale degree, right here, that expresses the major or minor essence, depending on what act it is.

Journey

One interesting use of key is in the video game Journey, by thatgamecompany. It features a robed traveller traversing a desert, to reach this gleaming mountain peak in the distance.

The first tracks start in B minor. In Threshold, the key changes to F ♯ minor. This is the first time in the game that the key has changed outside of the initial B minor key, reinforcing the idea of crossing the boundary of what you know, and entering into something new.

From there, the key changes again throughout — for example, A minor in Road of Trials, C minor in Descent, D minor in the temple. The changes for each new area enhance the feeling of progressing in a journey.

The music returns to B minor at the mountaintop for Apotheosis, and stays in B minor for I Was Born For This, the credits song. Thus it enables this seamless transition when the drone at the end of I Was Born For This blends into the drone at the starting screen which is also in B, reinforcing the idea of rebirth. You have returned back where you started, and so has the key.

Sky: Children of the Light (counter example)

An example where the key doesn’t support a game’s arc discernibly well is in thatgamecompany’s more recent release, Sky: Children of the Light. Sky shares some geographical, gameplay and thematic aspects of Journey — also featuring a caped traveller who can fly and aims to reach a mountain peak, this time in a cloud kingdom.

However, the key changes sporadically for sub-tracks throughout an area. This can lead to a feeling of sub-areas being small, isolated and unrelated, rather than being as part of one whole.

Having the same key for levels in an area is one way of unifying them to be part of one realm.

Both games have music split into cues like in many other games. The album of Journey has single tracks for whole realms, while Sky’s has the shorter cues completely separate. It is easier to arrange them for a single listening experience if they are in the same key. Otherwise, it can come across as abrupt, without transitions.

For example, in this vault, the key changes from F major to D major to D ♭ major to A major across the first four floors, with no transitions between each. This doesn't make it feel coherent.

In the rainy forest level, it changes from D major to C minor to D♭ major to F major to G major, across the 5 sub areas. Again this can break feelings of musical immersion. Any arc in the narrative is not reflected in the disruptive key changes in the music.

Your physical landscape has not changed — i.e. you’re still surrounded by the same tall trunks, soaking rain, and desaturated colour palette. But the musical landscape keeps changing! This may be subconsciously disorienting.