‘Music Is the Best Vehicle for Moments of Extreme Emotion’: How Shakira, Ricky Martin & More Crafted World Cup Anthems

Shakira was spending the holidays at her farm in Uruguay, across a vast ocean from South Africa, host country of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, when she conceived “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa).” Already a global phenom known for her vocals and dance moves, the Colombian star had quickly gone to work when presented with the opportunity to write a song for the upcoming soccer tournament, and she soon turned a track around that fused genres, languages and multinational beats with abandon.

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“It was sort of magical the way it happened, because I was just walking from the barn into the house, and I started singing the melody of the verse, with the lyrics, automatically, in English,” Shakira says. “It was like someone was dictating it from above. And I felt so connected to my childhood, to my roots, to my Afro Caribbean roots as well … I was so excited, I called the people at Sony and told them I had just written the most amazing World Cup song.”

“Waka Waka,” produced by Shakira with John Hill, was already catchy — but it became even more so after a fortuitous encounter in a New York studio between Hill and South African pop fusion group Freshly-ground, which then contributed to the song, adding a musical element that honored the host nation.

“Shakira moved swiftly from interest to creation, writing and recording a track that stood apart from the musical landscape at the time,” recalls Dusko Justic, senior vp of international artist strategy and development for Sony Latin Iberia, who at the time was responsible for the A&R and marketing for the official FIFA World Cup music program. “Once FIFA heard the finished record, there was no debate.”

For nearly four decades, FIFA has partnered with prominent musicians to craft songs that celebrate the World Cup and its competing nations. “Waka Waka,” the official song of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, remains the most successful World Cup song in history and a global juggernaut; its video has been viewed a staggering 4.4 billion times on YouTube, making it the platform’s eighth most viewed music video of all time. A decade after its release, Shakira would perform the enduring hit at another globally watched sporting event: the Super Bowl LIV halftime show, where it ended her co-headlining set with Jennifer Lopez.

“Waka Waka” had all the elements that make for a successful and enduring World Cup song: a danceable, uptempo beat to resonate with audiences around the world (the song samples “Zamina Mina [Zangaléwa],” by Cameroonian band Golden Sounds), an artist with global appeal and reach, and a featured artist representing the host nation. Shakira also recorded the song in Spanish, which drew in her Latin fan base. And significantly, she was already a genuine soccer aficionado; the song’s music video not only incorporated her signature dance moves but also major soccer stars from Lionel Messi to Gerard Piqué, who became Shakira’s longtime partner and the father of her two sons after meeting her at the video shoot.

World Cup songs are not always such massive hits — nor were they always officially sanctioned by FIFA. The first World Cup was played in 1930, but the event wouldn’t designate a song as “official” until the 1962 event in Chile when Chilean band Los Ramblers’ “El Rock del Mundial” was declared the tournament’s official song.

It’s unclear when FIFA became actively involved in the song’s selection (the organization did not respond to Billboard’s requests for comment), though multiple reports cite Italian composer Giorgio Moroder’s “To Be Number One,” recorded for the 1990 World Cup in Italy.

Since then, every tournament has had an official song, anthem or — for the past several World Cups — both. (The exact distinction between these designations has shifted over the years.) Some of them have been performed at the closing ceremony (as was the case with “Live It Up,” performed by Nicky Jam, Will Smith and Era Istrefi in 2018) and some at the opening ceremony (like 2014’s “We Are One [Ole Ola],” performed in Brazil by Pitbull, Jennifer Lopez and Brazilian artist Claudia Leitte).

But record labels didn’t -fully appreciate the possibilities of official songs until the 1998 tournament in France when, in addition to the official anthem (Youssou N’Dour and Axelle Red’s “La Cour des Grands [Do You Mind If I Play]”), Ricky Martin released the official song, “The Cup of Life.” With both English and Spanish (“La Copa de la Vida”) versions and its French rallying cry of “allez, allez, allez,” the track made the World Cup “the most influential and pivotal platform in the transition of helping to create the Latin explosion,” says Tommy Mottola, who was then Sony Music chairman.

“The Cup of Life,” with its mix of brash trumpets and Brazilian batucada, was a global hit, peaking at No. 45 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spending 34 weeks on the chart, long after the monthlong tournament had ended. It was so successful, in fact, that when Martin earned a 1999 Grammy nomination for best Latin pop performance for his Spanish-language album Vuelve (which included “The Cup of Life”), Mottola pushed hard to have him on the show, over the Recording Academy’s objections.

After the academy relented, the rest was history. Martin’s exuberant performance of “The Cup of Life” — complete with a huge backing band and performers on stilts — became what then-UTA head Rob Prinz called “the single biggest game-changing moment for any artist in the history of the Grammys.” It not only catapulted his career into the mainstream but also helped to usher in “the Latin explosion,” as it would become known stateside. “[Taking it] from the platform of the World Cup to the stage of the Grammys really was the key to set off this Latin explosion,” Mottola says. “There would probably be no Bad Bunny without this.”

The World Cup is, by far, the most widely seen sporting event in the world, with an estimated 5 billion people tuning in to watch the 2022 edition at some point, including 1.5 billion viewers for the tournament’s final match, according to FIFA. But while that platform “100% provides value” to any music release, Mottola says, it doesn’t guarantee huge, or lasting, commercial success.

Sony Music — which was FIFA’s official label partner for many years until 2019 — released “The Cup of Life” and “Waka Waka,” and in their wake, the importance of music as a promotional vehicle during the World Cup soared. What was once one “official” song became many, with tournament sponsors, broadcasters and individual countries commissioning original tracks.

“It used to be that there was a single song that FIFA chose and everybody used that song,” says Afo Verde, chairman/CEO of Sony Music Latin Iberia. “But after ‘Waka Waka,’ every brand, every network wanted to have a World Cup song. And while a hit is not something you simply dictate … it helps when there is a single song that’s played everywhere you go.”

But, Verde continues bluntly, “you need a real hit. And you look for a hit informed by what’s happening on the planet, what the social climate is. You need to embody the spirit of the sport, convey a message of unity, understanding it’s a competition. The song needs to reflect that each team is going to give their all.”

In 2021, FIFA launched its FIFA Sound strategy, meant to connect soccer and music fans, and partnered with Universal Music Group for a series of releases and initiatives that included the first-ever multisong FIFA World Cup official soundtrack for the 2022 event in Qatar.

From that soundtrack, “Arhbo,” performed by Ozuna with Congolese French rapper and singer–songwriter GIMS and produced by RedOne, topped Billboard’s Latin Airplay chart for three weeks in 2022.

At press time, FIFA had yet to announce an official tournament song or anthem for this year’s event, which will be jointly hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico. But official FIFA songs already include Robbie Williams’ “Desire” (penned for the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup), while last year Telemundo premiered its own official song, “Somos Más,” performed by Carlos Vives, Xavi, Wisin and Emilia.

There have been notable World Cup songs through the years. In 2014, “We Are One” hit No. 59 on the Hot 100; as of Jan. 22, it has 146.5 million on-demand official streams, according to Luminate. And K’Naan’s “Wavin’ Flag” from 2010 was chosen by Coca-Cola as its official song for the tournament, garnering 161.6 million on-demand streams in the United States and reaching No. 82 on the Hot 100.

But none have come close to “Waka Waka” in consumption or longevity — perhaps in part because Shakira fully understood the importance of the sport in the creation of the music, a rare combination.

“A World Cup song needs to have that feeling of adrenaline that you get when you’re playing or when you’re watching an exciting game,” she says. “A suspenseful pre-chorus, a joyous, explosive chorus. You have to feel the payoff. And I think the rhythm is important, so people can celebrate not only with the words but also with dancing, with their bodies. I think music is the best vehicle for moments of extreme emotion, like a World Cup can be.”

This story appears in the Feb. 7, 2026, issue of Billboard.