Shakira launches 12-concert Madrid run to close world tour after 8-year absence

Published on 18/09/2026 - 17:45 GMT+2

Shakira will on Friday night in Madrid launch a marathon of 12 concerts that will bring her world tour to a close and end an eight-year absence from Spanish stages.

The Colombian singer, 49, will perform until 11 October in a temporary venue with capacity for 50,000 spectators, erected in the south of the capital and dubbed "Shakira stadium", according to Live Nation, the tour promoter.

With no new European dates announced, Madrid authorities are counting on a major economic impact from her return to Spain. The city already hosted in May and June the ten concerts given by Bad Bunny, another of Latin music's biggest stars.

Shakira had not performed in Spain since 2018, several years before she made public in 2022 her separation from former Spanish footballer Gerard Piqué, the legendary Barcelona defender.

The artist launched in February 2025 a world tour to present "Las mujeres ya no lloran", an album inspired by her break-up with the former Barça player and with which she won her fourth Grammy Award.

Over a career spanning several decades, Shakira has sold more than 95 million records worldwide and performed both at the opening ceremony and at the final of the 2026 football World Cup. "Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)" was also the official song of the 2010 World Cup, held in South Africa, the first to take place on the African continent.

Shakira's return to Madrid also comes after, in November 2023, she paid a fine of 7.3 million euros as part of a settlement with the Spanish courts. The singer pleaded guilty in order to avoid a trial for tax fraud.

In that case, which attracted extensive media coverage, Shakira also paid 17.45 million euros to the Spanish tax authorities to regularise her fiscal situation in the country.