“What did heartbreak teach you, Danitsa?”

Congratulations on your own music label! Was founding it a liberating move?

I didn’t want to depend on others anymore, and at the same time I wanted to give something back to the younger generation and to other creatives.

In your new song “Wrong Things”, you sing about the pressure in the music industry. When did you start questioning your place in it?

With my first album came success in Switzerland and France, and I wanted more. So I went to Los Angeles, focused on the wrong things, and my music lost its DNA.

They put you in a box …

The industry wanted to turn me into the perfect mainstream pop star. I was supposed to change my name, my style and the way I sing. At some point, I had drifted away from myself. I spent two years looking for the right label. I couldn’t sleep, I was anxious, depressed. Writing music became my therapy. In my twenties, I tried to be flawless. Today, I’m simply Danitsa. That’s exactly where my freedom lies.

What does it mean to work as a woman in the music industry?

I don’t really want to see myself as a “woman in the music industry”. There were times when I was the only female artist at a festival. Today, more and more women are working on and behind the stage. I recently played an open-air festival with female sound engineers. We raised our voices and demanded what’s rightfully ours. Now things are changing.

Your new album is also about heartbreak and femininity. What did heartbreak teach you about yourself as a woman?

I didn’t know love could hurt that much. I cried for three years after the breakup. At the same time, beautiful songs came out of it. I realised that for far too long I hadn’t made myself a priority. Heartbreak showed me that I’m still surrounded by love: from my family, my friends and music, my greatest love. Step by step, I found my way back to myself, and to a new version of me, as a singer and as a woman.

Is the new version a better one?

I think so. When I sang “Miss Yo”, the song about my ex, live for the first time, the audience was so moved. I thought: thank you, I’d been feeling so bad for so long! The most beautiful gift was reaching others, but also finally seeing myself healed.

Photos: Julia Ishac; Text: annabelle