In the bowels of the Hard Rock Stadium of Miami, there is a note attached to the door of the Shakira Production Office: “Please, come back later … unless you are in flames.”
The pink scribbles written by hand suggest a stress level that is completely understandable for the team that is making the largest stadium tour of the year.
With 64 shows with exhausted tickets in North and South America, Shakira has played for more than two million fans.
“I have worked for more than a year, polishing every detail of the show, so this is really an incredible reward,” says the star to BBC News.
There are no worn nerves or shouting behind the stage before the show in Miami … and no one is in flames.
You may be interested in reading: Expirable health, logistics and security have marked Shakira’s tour
The atmosphere is quiet and professional. The dancers stretch in the halls, seamstresses
If you spend enough time, you will discover some surprising data from the tour.
“We travel with two washing machines and two dryers, which we connect at each headquarters,” says Hannah Kinkade’s dressing room, who only has to take care of 300 costumes.
Each set has to be renewed before a new show, he says, because “Shakira dances very hard and the dancers too.”
“The dancers wear both their shoes that we have to paint them again every morning.”
The stage director born in Birmingham, Kevin Rowe, shows us the dark corridors under the stage, where the team has hidden secret reserves of Gatorade and ice cream to help them survive the sticky heat of Miami.
“It’s very hot or it rains a lot,” he says about working in an outdoor show. “But that is the disadvantage of living in the underworld.”
Around 14:30, the band begins their sound test. Shortly after 15:00, Shakira herself arrives with her shameless hips, escorted by a policeman, and joins the team on stage.
Dressed with chopped silver jeans and a white sleeve shirt, you can’t help dancing while evaluating the place of the night.
“I came here for Beyoncé’s concert and was impeccable, so they better make me sound like this,” he jokes with the team.
Or is it a joke?
Shakira says the joke with a wink, but there is one thing that everyone recognizes behind the stage: the boss is a perfectionist.
“When she is at her best, she is,” says main dancer Darina Littleton. “When he enters, he is ready, his character is at his best, he is completely delivered.”
“She knows what she wants, and if she can’t discover it, she will get it in one way or another,” says musical director Tam Mitchell, who has been playing with Shakira since the 90s (even wrote the bread flute riff in Whenever, wherever).
It is very meticulous with every aspect of the show: the sound, the visual, the lighting, the bracelets, everything. It’s amazing. I don’t know how it does.
Obsession pays off
Shakira’s concert is two and a half hours of musical drama: an uninterrupted parade of bilingual successes, 13 changes of costumes and uninterrupted movement.
Make a dance of the libanese inspiration belly during eyes like this; a tribal knife routine to present Whenever, wherever; Hit a Flying-V guitar during Objection (Tango); And he has the public howling and rebuilding during an electrifying version of She Wolf.
The tour is titled the women no longer cry, in honor of the last Shakira album, which was inspired by some of the most intense personal pain and disorders that they have ever experienced.
Her 11 -year relationship with the footballer Gerard Piqué collapsed, at the same time that her father underwent emergency brain surgery and the Spanish authorities accused her of fiscal fraud for 14.5 million euros (12.7 million pounds) (he resolved the case extrajudicially).
“Many of you know that the last years have not been the easiest to me,” he says on stage. «But who doesn’t fall from time to time, right?
“What I have learned is that a fall is not the end, but the beginning of an even better trip.”
More specifically, the turbulence of his forty -many years caused a creative outbreak that put Shakira again in the cultural conversation after seven years of musical silence.
BZRP Music Sessions Vol 53 of 2023, a collaboration with the Argentine producer Bizarrap, was full of criticism aimed at Piqué and his new girlfriend (“You changed a rolex for a casio”) and won the song of the year in the Latin Grammy.
He continued the theme in a series of successful simple ones such as the sarcastic I congratulate you and TQG (you were great – I’M Too Good for You), a duet with the Colombian star Karol G, which has accumulated 1.3 billion views on Spotify.
“It’s a great inspiration for women,” says a fan, with hairy wolf ears, shortly before the show. «He has done everything. It is power ».
Shakira’s commitment to the show is such that he wants our interview to be after the stage. So, shortly after midnight, he appears from his dressing room, wearing, somehow, cooler than a margaritas field.
“I warn you that it may not make much sense right now,” he says laughing. “I’m still recovering.”
Today it was very hot and there was a lot of moisture. So, when it does so, or there is altitude, it is a great challenge … but it is totally worth it.
What happens when it is tired or sick?
«To set up a show of this size and make it possible every night, no matter if you are sad or if you had a bad day or if you are sick or have cough: you just have to do the best you can and, miraculously, make it happen.
«And adrenaline really does not let me feel the exhaustion or demanding it can be. It helps you move on. “
Learning from Leonard Cohen
Touching in Miami was particularly significant, he says, because it is the city he moved when he was a teenager in the hope of entering the western pop market.
By then, it was already a star in Colombia, but I knew that international success went to sing in English. The only problem was that I had never learned it.
“I was just 19 when I moved to the United States, like many other Colombian immigrants who arrive in this country looking for a better future,” he says.
«And I remember that I was surrounded by Spanish-English dictionaries and synonym dictionaries, because at that time I didn’t really have Google or Chatgpt to (help me). So everything was very precarious.
And then I got into poetry and started reading a bit of Leonard Cohen, Walt Whitman and Bob Dylan, trying to understand how English works in song composition. I think that’s how I became good at that.
Lately, he has been reflecting on these experiences, his acceptance in the United States and how that contrasts with the attitude of the Trump administration towards immigrants.
By accepting Grammy for the best Latin pop album earlier this year, he approached the situation directly.
«I want to dedicate this award to all my immigrant brothers and sisters in this country. They are loved, they are worth it and I will always fight with you, ”he said.
How does it feel, I wonder, be an immigrant in the United States today?
“It means living with constant fear,” he says. “And it is painful to see it.”
Now, more than ever, we must remain united. Now, more than ever, we must raise their voice and make it very clear that a country can change its immigration policies, but treatment to all people must always be human.
It is a powerful statement, partially in Spanish, while Shakira addresses directly to his Latin American fans.
This connection supports the success of his tour: his fans have grown up with Shakira and are reflected in it.
In Miami, the public covers generations: mothers and daughters singing in unison successes of the 90s as bare feet and white dreams and jumping to the rhythm of a waka waka holiday (this is Africa).
Therefore, the emotional moment of the show comes during acrostic, the tender ballad that Shakira wrote for his children, promising that he would remain strong in the midst of Piqué separation.
While acting, Sasha (12) and Milan (10) appear on video screens, making a duet with their mother.
“My heart melts every time I see them on that screen and listen to their voice,” says the star.
«They are all for me. They are my engine and the reason I am alive. So having them every night on stage is a beautiful moment ».
This is the first time that children are old enough to see their mother to act in a concert, and she confesses that they have “emotions found” about it
“When I have a show, they stress a little because they want everything to go perfect for me,” he says.
«They are always worried, like: ‘Mom, how did it go? Did you fall? Are you OK?’
«And I try to show you that there is no perfect show. It’s okay to make a mistake ».
The question for fans of the United Kingdom is: will the tour arrive in Europe?
«You have to be attentive. Wait and you will see, ”jokes Shakira.
We still can’t say dates, but we are close to announce them. I really want to share this show with my fans around the world.
Source: BBC Mundo
