Behind the scenes on tour, as she speaks out for immigrants within the US

[ad_1] Mark Savage Music Correspondent

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/0039/live/7058a6e0-4771-11f0-bdd6-438c9d4f20a6.jpg.webp" loading="eager" alt="Shakira Shakira, in a multi-coloured outfit, poses backstage at her Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran tour in April 2025" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Shakira Shakira's Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran tour has taken greater than $150m in ticket gross sales

Deep within the bowels of Miami's Onerous Rock Stadium, a notice is taped to the door of Shakira's manufacturing workplace. "Please come again later... until you are really on hearth."

The handwritten pink scrawl suggests a stage of stress that's fully comprehensible for the crew placing on the most important stadium tour of the 12 months.

With 64 offered out exhibits throughout North and South America, Shakira has performed to greater than two million followers.

"I've labored for over a 12 months, sprucing each single element of the present, so that is actually an incredible reward," the star tells BBC Information.

There aren't any frayed nerves or screaming matches backstage earlier than the Miami present... and no-one's on hearth.

The vibe is calm {and professional}. Dancers stretch within the corridors, seamstresses sew crystals onto catsuits, and guitar techs test and re-check their tunings.

Hold round lengthy sufficient and also you uncover a couple of shocking tour details.

"We journey with two washing machines and two tumble dryers, which we plumb in [at] each venue," says head of wardrobe Hannah Kinkade, who has a mere 300 costumes to take care of.

Stitched, Scrubbed and Stage-Prepared: Meet the girl behind Shakira’s tour costumes

Each outfit needs to be refreshed earlier than a brand new present, she says, as a result of "Shakira dances actually exhausting and the dancers do as nicely.

"The male dancers scuff their sneakers so badly that we've to repaint them each morning."

Birmingham-born stage supervisor Kevin Rowe exhibits us across the darkish corridors beneath the stage, the place the crew have stashed secret reserves of Gatorade and iced espresso to assist them survive the sticky Miami warmth.

“It both will get very popular or very moist,” he says of engaged on an outside present. “However that’s the trade-off of residing within the underworld.”

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/0e44/live/13feeb50-4773-11f0-bbaa-4bc03e0665b7.png.webp" loading="lazy" alt="A shot beneath the stage of Shakira's tour, showing various sets stashed away, waiting to be raised into place" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> All of the units are stashed away beneath the stage, and lifted into place on elevators at completely different instances through the present. Shakira's sneakers are already in place on this studded-crystal staircase, ready for her costume change

At about 2:30pm, the band begin their sound test. Shortly after 3pm, Shakira herself arrives together with her non-deceitful hips, flanked by a police escort, and joins the crew on stage.

Wearing flared silver denims and a white vest prime, she will't assist dancing as she assesses tonight's venue.

"I got here right here for the Beyoncé live performance and that was flawless, so that you'd higher make me sound like that," she jokes to the crew.

Or is it a joke?

Shakira delivers the quip with a wink, however there's one factor everybody acknowledges backstage: The boss is a perfectionist.

"When she's on, she's on," says chief dancer Darina Littleton. "When she is available in, she's prepared, her character's on, she's full out."

"She is aware of what she needs, and if she will't determine it out she'll get there a method or one other," says musical director Tim Mitchell, who's been enjoying with Shakira for the reason that Nineteen Nineties (he even wrote the pan pipe riff on Every time, Wherever).

"She's very specific about each side of the present: Sound, visible, lighting, the wristbands, each single factor. It is unimaginable. I do not know the way she does it."

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/6362/live/72c3d320-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Kevin Mazur / Getty Images Shakira leaps in the air during her show at Miami's Hard Rock stadium" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Kevin Mazur / Getty Pictures Shakira's two-and-a-half hour present is an intense bodily exercise

The obsession pays off.

Shakira's live performance is two-and-a-half hours of musical drama - a continuous parade of bilingual hits, 13 costume adjustments and continuous motion.

She performs a Lebanese-inspired stomach dance throughout Ojos Asi; a tribal knife routine to introduce Every time, Wherever; thrashes a Flying-V guitar throughout Objection (Tango); and has the viewers howling and braying via an electrifying model of She Wolf.

The tour is titled Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran (Girls No Longer Cry) after Shakira's newest album, which was impressed by a number of the most intense heartbreak and private upheaval she'd ever skilled.

Her 11-year relationship with footballer Gerard Piqué fell aside, similtaneously her father had emergency mind surgical procedure, and Spanish authorities accused her of €14.5m (£12.7m) tax fraud (she settled the case out of courtroom).

"Lots of you recognize that the previous years have not been the best for me," she says on stage. "However who does not have a fall right here and there, proper?

"What I've realized is {that a} fall is not the top, however the starting of a fair higher journey."

Extra particularly, the turbulence of her mid-40s prompted a inventive outburst that put Shakira again within the cultural dialog after seven years of musical silence.

2023's Bzrp Music Periods Vol 53, a collaboration with Argentine producer Bizarrap, was filled with barbs directed at Piqué and his new girlfriend ("you traded a Rolex for a Casio") and received tune of the 12 months on the Latin Grammys.

She continued the theme on a string of hit singles just like the sarcastic Te Felicito (I Congratulate You) and TQG (Te Quedó Grande - I am Too Good for You), a duet with fellow Colombian star Karol G, which has racked up 1.3 billion streams on Spotify.

"She's so inspiring to girls," says one fan, carrying furry she-wolf ears, shortly earlier than the present. "She's achieved all of it. She is energy."

Expertise what it is prefer to stroll on stage with Shakira

Shakira's dedication to the present is such that she needs our interview to happen after she comes off stage. So shortly after midnight, she seems from her dressing room, in some way wanting more energizing than a area of daisies.

"I warn you, I may not make lots of sense proper now," she laughs. "I am nonetheless recovering.

"It was actually scorching as we speak and humid. So at any time when it is like that, or there's altitude, it's extremely difficult... however completely price it."

What occurs when she's drained or sick?

"To place collectively a present of this dimension, and to make it occur each evening, it does not matter in the event you're unhappy or in the event you had a nasty day or in the event you're sick otherwise you're coughing - you simply should do your finest and miraculously make it occur.

"And the adrenalin really does not let me really feel the exhaustion, or how demanding it may be. It carries you thru."

Studying from Leonard Cohen

Taking part in in Miami was significantly significant, she says, as a result of it is town she moved to as a teen, hoping to interrupt into the Western pop market.

By that time, she was already a star in Colombia, however she knew worldwide success meant singing in English. The one downside was, she had by no means realized it.

"I used to be solely 19 once I moved to the US, like many different Colombian immigrants who come to this nation on the lookout for a greater future," she says.

"And I keep in mind I used to be surrounded by Spanish-English dictionaries and synonym dictionaries - as a result of again within the day I did not actually have Google or ChatGPT to [help]. So it was all very precarious.

"After which I obtained into poetry and began studying just a little little bit of a Leonard Cohen and Walt Whitman and Bob Dylan, attempting to grasp how the English language works inside songwriting. I believe that is how I obtained good at it."

Currently, she's been reflecting on these experiences, her acceptance in America, and the way that contrasts with the Trump administration's perspective to immigrants.

Accepting the Grammy for finest Latin pop album earlier this 12 months, she addressed the scenario instantly.

"I wish to dedicate this award to all my immigrant brothers and sisters on this nation. You're cherished, you're price it, and I'll at all times battle with you," she stated.

How does it really feel, I ask, to be an immigrant within the US as we speak?

"It means residing in fixed worry," she says. "And it is painful to see.

"Now, greater than ever, we've to stay united. Now, greater than ever, we've to boost our voices and make it very clear {that a} nation can change its immigration insurance policies, however the therapy of all folks should at all times be humane."

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/05f7/live/fbd31ae0-4774-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.png.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Shakira laughs during an interview with BBC News" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Shakira caught up with the BBC an hour after coming off stage

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/a741/live/c4356f20-4774-11f0-84b6-6bf0f66205f1.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Getty Images Shakira and her dancers pull dance moves while performing under a giant sculpture of a she-wolf" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Getty Pictures The present ends with Shakira performing beneath an enormous statue of a She-Wolf she's christened Isabel

It is a highly effective assertion – spoken partially in Spanish as Shakira addresses her Latin American followers instantly.

That connection underpins the success of her tour - followers have grown up with Shakira and see themselves mirrored in her.

In Miami, the viewers spans generations – with moms and daughters singing in unison to 90s hits like Pies Descalzos, Sueños Blancos and bouncing round to a celebratory Waka Waka (This Time for Africa).

That is why the emotional excessive level of the present comes throughout Acróstico – the tender ballad Shakira wrote for her youngsters, promising them she'd keep sturdy amid the break up from Piqué.

As she performs, Sasha (12) and Milan (10) seem on the video screens, duetting with their mum.

"My coronary heart melts each time I see them on that display and I hear their little voices," says the star.

"They're simply every thing to me. They're my engine and the explanation why I am alive. So having them each evening on stage, it is simply such a treasured second."

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/66c9/live/3d79e5f0-4775-11f0-9471-e380f647874e.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Getty Images Shakira and her sons at the 2023 MTV Awards" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Getty Pictures Shakira's sons Sasha (proper) and Milan (left) reside together with her in Miami

That is the primary time the boys have been sufficiently old to see their mum carry out in live performance, and she or he confesses they've "blended feelings" about it.