Awaara Hoon
"Awaara Hoon" | |
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Song by Mukesh from the album Awaara | |
Released | 1951 |
Genre | film song |
Writer(s) | Shailendra |
Composer(s) | Shankar Jaikishan |
Language | hindi |
"Awaara Hoon" (hindi: आवारा हूँ; Aavaara huun Urdu: آواره هوں; Russian: Бродяга я) is an internationally popular song from the 1951 classic hindi film, Awaara, starring Raj Kapoor.[1][2] The song was written in the Hindi language by lyricist Shailendra and sung by Mukesh.[3] "Awaara Hoon" immediately struck "a chord in audiences from various classes and backgrounds all over India and beyond: in China, in the Soviet Union, in the Middle East."[4] In China, "both the song and film were said to be Chairman Mao's favourites."[1] In a May 2013 BBC poll, the song was rated the second-greatest Bollywood song of all time.[5]
Local versions
The popularity of "Awaara Hoon" led to the creation of localized versions of the song in Greece, Turkey, the Middle East, the Soviet Union, China,[6] and Romania.
Example verse
The refrain of the song is "Awaara Hoon", which means "I am a vagabond/tramp". The song is in Hindi - Urdu, which is usually written in either Devanagari or Nastaliq. It has a catchy, rhythmic tempo with several short lines interposed with a few slightly longer ones. It is still considered to be a timeless song of much of South Asia and the Balkans/Russian area.
Hindi | Transcription | English translation | Russian translation |
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Абара я, абара я, |
See also
References
- 1 2 Linda Badley; R. Barton Palmer; Steven Jay Schneider, Traditions in world cinema, Rutgers University Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0-8135-3874-7,
... To this day 'Awaara hoon' ('I'm a vagabond'), the title song of Raj Kapoor's Awaara ('The Vagabond', 1951) remains well known throughout Russia, which the director- star visited, and China, where both the song and film were said to be Chairman Mao's favourites ...
- ↑ Natasa Ďurovičová, World cinemas, transnational perspectives, Taylor & Francis, 2010, ISBN 978-0-415-97653-4,
... hearing the hit theme song “Awaara Hoon” (“I am wayward”) hummed on the streets of Nanjing. Then, traveling through a small town in a more remote part of China, Seth has to perform the song on request at a local gathering: 'No sooner have I begun than I find that the musicians have struck up the accompaniment behind me: they know the tune better than I do ...
- ↑ Ashraf Aziz, Light of the universe: essays on Hindustani film music, Three Essays Collective, 2003, ISBN 978-81-88789-07-8,
... Its title song Awaara hoon, written by Shailendra, remains the best-appreciated Hindustani film song in foreign countries ...
- ↑ Bhaskar Sarkar, Mourning the nation: Indian cinema in the wake of Partition, Duke University Press, 2009, ISBN 978-0-8223-4411-7,
... When Raj sings cheerfully about the pleasures of being a street-smart vagabond (“Awaara Hoon”), he strikes a chord in audiences from various classes and backgrounds all over India and beyond: in China, in the Soviet Union, in the Middle East ...
- ↑ "100 Greatest Bollywood Songs of All Time"
- ↑ Tejaswini Ganti, Bollywood: a guidebook to popular Hindi cinema, Psychology Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-415-28853-8,
... Their title track for Awaara, “Awaara Hoon” (I'ma vagabond) was immensely popular world-wide, leading to local versions of the song in Greece, the Middle East, the Soviet Union, and China ...