Few artists can claim to have beaten a record set by Taylor Swift and Beyoncé, but up-and-coming star Ella Langley has done just that. The singer’s hit singles “Choosin’ Texas” and “Be Her” have topped Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart at Nos. 1 and 2, respectively, for the second week in a row. This makes her the first woman to ever hold the chart’s top two positions for multiple weeks; Swift and Beyoncé each achieved the feat once.
“‘Choosin’ Texas’ logs a 16th week at No. 1, earning 22.7 million official U.S. streams, 44.7 million in radio airplay audience and 6,000 sold in the March 6–12 tracking week, according to Luminate,” Billboard reports. “‘Be Her,’ at its No. 2 high, totaled 12 million streams, 4 million in airplay reach and 2,000 sold.”
Beyond the Hot Country Songs chart, “Choosin’ Texas” has hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 for a fourth week, making a big win for country music in general. The song has crossed over into pop territory, although it is “still a traditional-leaning country song about two-step dancing with prominent steel guitar,” Saving Country Music points out.
The song’s arrangement does, however, benefit from pop-style arranging. Song analysis service Hit Songs Deconstructed identified a subtle trick for driving listener impact, describing a chain of arranging decisions that refresh the song’s flow and sharpen its emotional peaks.
“Hit Songs Deconstructed refers to these tactics as S.I.A.s (Section Impact Accentuators), and in ‘Choosin’ Texas,’ they function like precision edits, using strategic subtraction and addition to spotlight key moments without resorting to blunt, predictable dynamics,” they write.
They define the moments as subtraction or addition. For instance, at the last bar of the first verse, the accompaniment drops out to give space before the chorus. Similarly, the last two bars of the chorus clear out to bring our focus to the emotional weight of the lyrics “He’s choosin’ Texas, I can tell.”
The end of the next verse and chorus are both additive, placing a pronounced drum fill on the last bar to announce the new sections. “Choosin’ Texas” returns to the subtractive “S.I.A” style on the tail end of the bridge and final chorus. In all, there are very few moments that a section is not resolved without an accent.
“From brief accompaniment pullbacks to multi-stage breakdowns and builds, ‘Choosin’ Texas’ uses these six SIAs to keep the listener engaged at the exact moments where familiarity can turn into predictability,” Hit Songs Deconstructed concludes.
Listen to the song to catch those Section Impact Accentuators:
From a more musical perspective, we can see that the song benefits from subtlety in other ways. The song is written in the key of Db and does not follow a typical I-IV-V pattern so commonly found in country. The V chord (Ab) is reserved for short periods. Each phrase of the verse begins either on Ebmin, the ii chord, or Gbmaj, the IV chord. Neither progression has the authority of an authentic V-I cadence, leaving a sense of ambiguity and restlessness in the music. This, of course, perfectly counters the lyrical limbo in which Langley reflects on the loss of her love.
Between its vivid lyrics, smart production, and unsettled chord movement, “Choosin’ Texas” turns heartbreak into something listeners can feel as much as hear. It’s the kind of detailed country song that can dominate the music world and still reveal new layers with every listen.
