
“We need to make sure that this fountain retains its dignity and that the music chosen for it doesn’t, for example, make a joke out of it. “Dubai is very strongly trying to market itself as an international destination and the Fountain, which welcomes so many visitors to Dubai, is a major part of that,” he says. Head choreographer Peter Kopik (red shirt) in the control room above The Dubai Fountain, working on a new performance on WET’s proprietary programming software, Courtesy WET Peter Kopik, head of choreography for Los Angeles-based company WET, which designed and operates the fountain, says he and his colleagues take responsibility for ensuring its “dignity” is preserved. The UAE National Anthem is played every day.”

The frequency means that there can be diversity, as Ahmad Al Matrooshi, managing director Emaar properties explains: "This means we can roll out a significant selection of songs, which appeal to the international profile of our visitors at Downtown Dubai. On average, there are 13 Dubai Fountain shows daily (at 30 minute intervals) - they run at 1pm and 1.30pm and 6pm to 11pm daily (and 1.30pm to 2pm on Fridays). "We need to make sure that this fountain retains its dignity and that the music chosen for it doesn’t, for example, make a joke out of it," says Peter Kopik, head of choreography for Los Angeles-based company WET.

Instead, it is a tribute to the careful curation behind the show that every one of the 48-plus pieces of music that has been chosen for the fountains to dance to over the past decade has never seemed anything but perfectly at home, chosen to complement both the fountain and the city. The Dubai Fountain playlist is not a cynical effort to ingratiate the city with each and every tourist or expat – the sheer diversity of visitors to Dubai would make that an impossible task.

Yet in the nine years Dubai’s world-famous dancing fountain has been drawing vast crowds, all these and more have been called upon to supply the soundtrack for what has become the single most popular tourist attraction in a city not short of spectacles or experiences. It would be a brave promoter who envisaged staging an eclectic concert featuring such diverse talents as British singer-songwriter Adele, Italian opera tenor Luciano Pavarotti, US pop star Lionel Richie, French chanteuse Édith Piaf, Emirati singer Eida Al Menhali, Czech classical composer Antonín Dvořák and K-pop boy band EXO.
