Hur Turuf - All Around - read the story behind the song and hear the in-progress version LIVE!
2nd April 2023
Hello!
I grew up in the late 60's and 70's, listening to film songs, what we now call Bollywood but to us they were FILMS. Indian cinema and to a lesser extent, films from Pakistan.
In my house apart from the TV, films were the only form of entertainment.
We lived in Bradford, in Manningham, an area that was almost purely Asian, mainly Pakistani. Once a week we went as a family to the local cinema and once a week our parents would go on their own., leaving the older children in charge of the younger ones.
So my earliest and most constant memories are of cinemas, the big screen, the costumes and the MUSIC the MUSIC the music.
Lata.
Rafi.
The radiogram - remember them?! I especially loved stacking the 6 LPs on the spindle and they would play one after another, clattering down on to the turntable one by one.
Come to think of it, it probably wasn't very good for the records!
The golden oldies - the evergreen favourite songs. When we girls (yes it was always and only the girls) had finished all the cooking and cleaning we would go upstairs and have a ‘sing song’ - some of my happiest moments were then, making up words to songs we only knew the first line to, dancing along with the latest hit song.
So that's the inspiration for Hur Turuf - All Around.
The words were written by my mother about my father. My father died in 1976, and my mother died in 2022. She lived without him for a lot longer than they were married. She wrote a lot, my mother and I know that she was a very frustrated artist - she was only allowed to express herself through cooking and sewing (the exact words I used in my song Anticlockwise years later!) and I do wonder what she would have done with the freedom that later generations of women enjoyed.
She didn't live to hear this version, where I translated her words into English and set it to a deliberately over-the -top Bollywood orchestration.
I like to think they would both like it.
And here's the thing: in my culture there's a concept called KHUTUM, which literally means ENDING. It refers to the reading of the Koran to bless the soul of the person who has died. It was done regularly by my mother for my father.
Well, this song feels like my version of that tradition. Each time I sing it, I feel the two of them. I sense them, I honour them, I thank them, and I imagine them enjoying this song. I don't know if it does something positive for their souls, but I KNOW it does something positive for mine.
This is where music may be healing.
They both LOVED Indian and Pakistani films and I got my love of music through what we now term Bollywood.
So for me it feels important to arrange this song in that old Bollywood style, with soaring over-the-top orchestration, violins, drama, the works! Dropping into the simpler melodies of the verses.
And that's exactly what I have created with the violin and accordion wonderful Phil Toms strings and accordion arrangement and
Steve Bingham on violins and recording
Jason Frederick accordion and recording
so watch this space!
Now it's time I share the promised in-progress performance of Hur Turuf - All Around from my show at the Norwich Arts Centre for International Women's Day 2022.
Remember the newly mixed and MASTERED version will be released along with my album on the 9th June - save the date!
Here it is!
LYRICS:
Hur Turuf – All Around
All around just celebrates you
All around is you just you
My dreams are just you
My thoughts are just you
My every morning
Dawns just with you
This gathering spring
Grows from your breath
Blossoming flowers
Are scented with you
This world only is
In this yearning for you
The world and my heart
Just turning for you
Hur turuf tera julva
Hur turuf too hi too
Meri kwabon me tu
Khayalon me tu
Mei hur ik subha ke
Ujale me tu
Baharon ke mehfil
Jawan tere dum se
Mehekti phoolon se
Teri khushboo
Ye duniya hae qayam
Tusuver se tere
Merai dil ki duniya
Meh hae tu hi tu
حور تروف
حور تروف تیرا جلوہ
حور تروف تو ہی تو
میری خوابوں میں تو خیالوں میں تو
میری ہَر اِک صبح کِہ اجالے میں تو
بہاروں کی محفل جوان تیرے دم سے
مہکتی پُھولوں سے تیری خوشبو
یہ دُنیا ہے قائِم تَصَوُّر سے تِرے
میرے دل کی دُنیا میں ہی تو ہی تو
اِمْتِضاض طَاہِرَہ مَلِک
All Around
All around just celebrates you
All around is you just you
My dreams are just you
My thoughts are just you
My every morning
Dawns just with you
This gathering spring
Grows from your breath
Blossoming flowers
Are scented with you
This world only is
In this yearning for you
The world and my heart
Just turning for you
Urdu lyrics : Imtiaz Tahira Malik
Translation and English lyrics: Samia Malik
With my love!
Samia X