Learn how Shakira’s ‘Waka Waka’ became the biggest World Cup song

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Last Monday (5), while the Brazilian team lined up goals and dances against South Korea, singer Shakira shared on Instagram a video of Brazilians dancing on a street painted green and yellow and with the traditional party-style flags junina.

The audiovisual piece, a creation of the influencer Raphael Vicente, has as its soundtrack the music of the Colombian woman who became a symbol of the World Cup.

Even without direct relation to this edition of the World Cup, held in Qatar, the track “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)”, sung by Shakira and made for the 2010 edition of the Cup, held in South Africa, was featured again in TV commercials, appearing among the most listened to streaming and populating the minds of fans. After 12 years, it has solidified itself as the main anthem of the soccer competition, something that a new study tries to explain.

According to a survey by the American website SeatPick, “Waka Waka” is the most chic song in football tournaments involving selections in history. To reach the conclusion, the study takes into account Spotify metrics that measure levels of “danceability”, energy, valence and speech.

While the first two measurements are self-explanatory, valence considers the “positiveness” of a song—that is, the higher the valence, the more upbeat and euphoric the song is, while the opposite indicates that the track is more melancholy and depressing. The speech index refers to the number of words pronounced during the song.

To these measurements, the study adds a score based on the popularity of the songs based on the numbers on YouTube —on the platform alone, “Waka Waka” exceeds 3 billion views— and arrives at a score from zero to ten for songs from an average. Shakira’s track dominates the rankings, with the highest note, followed by the theme of the current World Cup, from Qatar, “Hayya Hayya (Better Together)”, by Trinidad artists Cardona, Davido and Aisha.

The top 5 of the study also includes “La Copa de la Vida”, theme of the 1998 World Cup, in France, sung by Ricky Martin, “We Are One (Ole Ola)”, by Pitbull with Jennifer Lopez and Claudia Leitte, for the 2014 World Cup held in Brazil, and “Wavin’ Flag”, by K’naan, music for a Coca-Cola advertisement related to the World Cup in South Africa.

Overall, the study seems to faithfully reflect popular sentiment. The exception is the good assessment of the theme of the current Cup, which, despite the high audience numbers and Spotify indicators, does not indicate that it will be remembered in a few years — just like what happened with “Live it Up”, by Nicky Jam , Will Smith and Era Istrefi, the song of the Russian Cup, 2018.

All the songs in the top 5 of the study were made from 1998, when FIFA, the entity that organizes the World Cup, had a change of direction. Before, the themes of the Worlds were more eclectic and generally created by artists from the host country – with the Chilean band Los Ramblers playing the 1962 song or the Spaniard Plácido Domingo interpreting the 1982 song.

From the World Cup in France, there was a shift towards selecting big global stars, regardless of their nationality. It worked with the music of Ricky Martin, still remembered today, and the recipe of making danceable and contagious songs was repeated, taking a ride on the success of pop music stars —one of the songs from the Qatar Cup, for example, is sung by Jung Kook, from the South Korean group BTS, a giant in audience in the world.

Although “We Are One (Ole Ola)”, from the Copa do Brasil, is well remembered, “Waka Waka” was the song that worked best within this strategy. In an interview at the time, Shakira stated that she created the song when she was on her farm in Uruguay. “When a song sounds good with just voice and guitar, you know there’s something there,” she said.

Shakira’s creation was recorded with the South African band Freshly Ground, in a search for the intersection between Caribbean and African cultures. The group got into music by chance after drummer Pete Cohen met producer John Hill in a New York studio.

Shakira’s “Waka Waka” borrows elements from the track “Zangalewa (Waka Waka)”, released in 1986 by the Cameroonian band Golden Sounds —later renamed “Zangalewa”—, giving yet another touch of originality to the work —which, despite the pop appeal, it stands out among the pasteurized sounds of the other themes of Copa. With Cameroonian origin, the expression that names the track means something like “do it”.

Despite the clear inspiration in the chorus of Cameroonian music, Shakira’s track was released without the band’s authorization —received just days before the World Cup, in May 2010. Zangalewa, formed by four military personnel, even ended its activities, but ended up returning to play shows thanks to the boost given by the hit.

FIFA found its hits when it took a more global approach to music, but, paradoxically, the strength of “Waka Waka” also lies in its connections with the music of the African continent. More than the billions of plays, which only grow as new World Cups are held, Shakira’s music has become synonymous with the most popular sporting event on the planet.

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