You're listening to Song Exploder,
where musicians take apart their songs and piece by piece tell the story of how they were made.
I'm Rishikesh Hirway.
Aruj Afdab is a singer and composer based in Brooklyn.
She grew up in Saudi Arabia, but her family is from Pakistan.
And earlier this year, she made history by becoming the first Pakistani artist to win a Grammy.
Her song, Mahabath, won the Best Global Music Performance Grammy.
and she was nominated for Best New Artist.
Mahabhath was first released on her 2021 album, Vulture Prince,
but it's been a part of Aruja's life for a long time.
In this episode, she tells the story of how the song was first born,
and how it lived with her and evolved over the years before she finally recorded it.
My name is Aruj Aftab.
Mohabbat Karne Wale is this poem written by this guy Hafiz Hoshiarpuri.
He was born in 1912 and he wrote this beautiful poem of which I've taken some lines and adapted them into my song,
Mohabbat.
Many,
many different singers from South Asia have rendered this poem to song over the course of time.
This is legendary Pakistani singer Mehdi Hassan.
I would consider it sort of like a South Asian standard.