Psychic disjunctures in Denmark: Danish female musicians’ anxieties as a labour of believability

A recent survey (n=986) by this research team as part of a project entitled ‘When Music Speaks’ found that female, career-oriented musicians in Denmark were an at-risk group for clinically significant anxiety. This article draws on semi-structured interviews with eight female respondents to this survey to explore potential psychosocial causes. We undertake thematic analysis within a theoretical architecture of ‘believability’, and in doing so acknowledge the need to believe something which, in the economy of believability, may appear un believable: high rates of anxiety among female musicians in a country famed for high levels of subjective wellbeing and apparent gender equality. As a possible explanation, we highlight psychic disjunctures experienced by interviewees; disjunctures between an imaginary of Denmark rooted in egalitarian social democracy committed publicly to principles of innovation, gender equality and social cohesion, contrasted with the anxious lived experience of the women we spoke to (which they wanted others to believe), being one of musical conservativism, restrictive cultural norms and loneliness. This article contributes towards sociologically-oriented and theoretically-underpinned literature into musicians’ mental health, global scholarship on the occupational psychosocial lives of female musicians, and cultural, political and anthropological work on Danish society.