Arooj Aftabs Mohabbat Gets Presidential Nod The singer-songwriters track was listed on former President Barack Obamas 2021 summer playlist.
By
Kimberly Ashton
July 14, 2021
Arooj Aftab B.M. 10
Image courtesy of the artist
When Arooj Aftab B.M. '10 woke up Saturday morning, she knew something big, something good, had happened, but she wasn't sure what it was.
My phone was completely blowing up and I was just getting a lot of text messages, and my Instagram was looking crazy, like hundreds of new followers and being tagged everywhere, and I was like What is going on?' Aftab, a singer and composer, said from her Brooklyn home.
Something like this had happened in May, when Pitchfork wrote about her, and again that month when Time magazine named her song Mohabbat as one of the seven best of 2021, and on Saturday, the song made another prominent list. President Barack Obama put it on his 38-track summer playlist. Its release has become an annual event, certifying the season's coolest tunes.
Mohabbat, a meditative song about love and letting go, is the fifth of seven tracks on Aftab's new album, Vulture Prince. The record is her third since graduating from Berklee in 2010 with a double major in jazz composition and music production and engineering.
We caught up with Aftab after the playlist's release to talk about that momentous morning, her music, and her Berklee years. Below is an edited version of that conversation.
Congratulations on making Obama's playlist. What was your reaction when you heard the news? Aftab: Just, you know, gratitude. Its quite a big cosign. The album has been out since March and its just been doing so well, its been being received so well. This felt like another kind of affirmation. I felt very grateful and very humbled by it.
[Obama] is iconic and getting that recognition from him really does mean a lot . The fact that he put it on that list, with all those other different artists, made me feel really good about the fact that...if you make something good you will be rewarded for it, or merit can get you far. It kind of reassured me that good music will still be recognized and heard whether its being super-represented or not.
I feel like that really broke that ceiling for me. Its similar when Time put out their favorite songs of this year and its like Lil Nas X, Olivia Rodrigo, Cardi B, and me. It's like, what is this list, how is that? So it's nice. It feels really good. People are really loving this song. It's speaking to people on a really wide and surprising level, which feels great.
Obama's list is not just a collection of his favorite songs, but a playlist. What do you think about it being in between Joni Mitchell's Coyote and Erykah Badu's Didn't Cha Know ? I do think that they flow together. I think they did a good job with the placement of it. There was some musical intention there, even in the order, which feels like its not just some random hype list. Knowing Obamas style, that's kind of how he rolls. Theres more to it than just what meets the eye. Theres just this attention to detail when he puts out stuff about arts and culture.
It means a lot to me personally that he included me on there, because I think that often doesnt happen, because Im a Pakistani American, brown, queer, female artist, and in so many ways that kind of puts you aside from from the main story a lot of the time. I just feel like hes really cool to do that. Maybe Im reading too much into it, maybe he just likes the song or whatever, but I think that theres a lot of meaning there in putting me on that list.
Mohabbat means love in Urdu. What is this song about? The poetry was written in the 1920s by Hafeez Hoshiarpuri, and it's kind of like a jazz standard. A lot of different musicians have done iterations of this, let's say, standard.
Mohabbat
Seeing how you have ample lovers around you, I will not be one of them.
This is sad, as I love you the most. The sadness of this is equal to the sadness of all the world.
And were there not this one sadness, how much happiness would there be in this world.
And even if I do somehow get to be one of your lovers, the sadness of my time spent in separation from you will be all that consumes me.
I will not be one of those lovers to you.
-Translation by Arooj Aftab
The poetry itself is really beautiful and appeals to a lot of different circumstances. It says the world will continue to love you and you will have an endless amount of lovers, but I wont be one of them. It also says the sadness of not being able to love you is equivalent to all the sadness that exists in the world, so its kind of dramatic and kind of soulful. It's very sweet. Its not someone angry or annoyed. Its kind of like a passing on, a moving on, a closure song.
Why were you drawn to this poem? Because of the way that its written so simply and so beautifully so I really always found this poetry fitting into my life in different moments, so Ive always really loved this poem.
Theres recordings of me playing it live from like 2011, so like its been in my repertoire for many years, and Ive just kind of been slowly but surely figuring out how exactly I want it to be recorded.
You've said that part of what gave rise to the album this song is on, Vulture Prince, was the death of your brother (in 2018). His passing is now in everything that I do, in a subtle way, which is also good because thats kind of what you should be doing when something like this happens. You have to make it part of your day-to-day, as opposed to thinking of it as an isolated incident and trying to get over it. I think that the sentiment of his passing is in the entire album but, yeah, it's also very much in this song.
Listen to Mohabbat:
Did you write the music for this version of Mohabbat ?
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
06/12/2025
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. A new survey from Pixitmedia by Datacore revealed a major shift in the Media & Entertainment industry in media archiving, with 85% of resp...
06/12/2025
HACKENSACK, N.J. LiveU has announced that the national public broadcaster Czech Television has completed one of the largest LiveU live production deployments fo...
06/12/2025
NEW YORK The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) presented the Excellence in Production Technology Emmy Award to NASA+ and Dr. Tom Leight...
05/12/2025
2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Curt Gowdy Jr. - Master Storyteller, Nati...
05/12/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Veritone's Sean King on the Power of Mining Video, Audio DataThe company's Data Refinery offers users total control and governance over da...
05/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: Inside the Nashville Predators' Unified, Flexible, Sca...
05/12/2025
Netflix Reaches Agreement To Acquire Warner Bros. Following Planned WBD SplitThe deal does not include WBDs sports assets like TNT Sports (US, UK, LatAm), Euros...
05/12/2025
FOX Sports Returns to Indianapolis for Primetime Broadcast of Big Ten Championsh...
05/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: Digital Engagement & Monetization Workshop Tackles the ...
05/12/2025
Atlanta United Lights Up New Emory Healthcare Studio With First Live Broadcast f...
05/12/2025
As Messi Takes the Pitch, MLS, Apple, NEP Roll Out Largest MLS Cup Production Ev...
05/12/2025
ESPN Enters College Football's Most Intense Month With Elevated Workflows fo...
05/12/2025
It's about that time! Awards season is in full swing, and the Film Independe...
05/12/2025
Every year, Spotify Wrapped offers a personalized look back at the audio that defined your year. It's a snapshot of your listening habits, designed to tell ...
05/12/2025
In 2025, Spotify's EQUAL, GLOW, and RADAR programs celebrated women, LGBTQIA , and emerging artists who turned moments into milestones. From breaking record...
05/12/2025
In our latest blog, we explain how Wi-Fi 7 rollouts can drive consumer loyalty with value-add services such as consumer cybersecurity. We also explore how this ...
05/12/2025
LOS ANGELES Netflix announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire the assets of Warner Bros. for $82.7 billion....
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Nielsens Gracenote has launched Gracenote Content Connect, a new ad platform that provides agencies, brands, supply-side platforms (SSPs) and demand-si...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK In an most important update to the workings of deal-based programmatic advertising, IAB Tech Lab has released version 1.0 of its Deals API for public c...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Pass the turkey. Pass the stuffing. Pass the cranberry sauce. All are common requests of Americans celebrating Thanksgiving Day with family and f...
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Iris, the new cloud-connected camera control platform, has officially launched with features that turn virtually any PTZ camera into a software-connect...
05/12/2025
HOLLYWOOD, Calif. Netflix announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire the assets of Warner Bros. for $82.7 billion....
05/12/2025
NEW YORK Iris, the new cloud-connected camera control platform, has officially launched with features that turn virtually any PTZ camera into a software-connect...
05/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has approved AT&T's $1.02 billion acquisition of spectrum from UScellular in a decision that was issued sho...
05/12/2025
The Best Coldplay Songs: 21 Tracks That Shoot for the Stars From Yellow to Viva La Vida, Fix You to Paradise, this playlist goes back to the start.
December ...
05/12/2025
Zafris Lecture Series Brings Nabil Ayers to Berklee The 32nd annual James G. Zafris Distinguished Lecture series was held on Thursday, November 13, with guest...
05/12/2025
Friday 5 December 2025
A new Game of Thrones Tale: Official trailer for Sky Exc...
05/12/2025
Back to All News
Don Lee, Lee Jin-uk, and Lalisa Manobal to Star in Netflix Act...
05/12/2025
Tis the season of giving once again and this year we've taken our Give Back Fridays' concept and turned it on its head.
In the autumn we were approach...
05/12/2025
Brayden Gogis doesn't remember a time when he wasn't completely fixated on games in all forms. In preschool, when they asked us to dress up as what we ...
05/12/2025
The Grinch steals the spotlight as the theme for The Late Late Toy Show 2025
Tune in tonight at 9:35pm on RT One and worldwide on RT Player
#LateLateToyShow...
05/12/2025
RT Announces New Presenters of Flagship News Programmes
New RT Six One News co-presenter Tommy Meskill
Sarah McInerney & Justin McCarthy join Morning Ir...
04/12/2025
ToolsOnAir Blackmagic Design HyperDeck Event Presets for just:in mac pro 2025 & ...
04/12/2025
ToolsOnAir AJA Ki Pro Event Presets for just:in mac pro 2025 & just:in linux
More Details:Starting with version 5.5, both just:in mac pro and just:in linux sol...
04/12/2025
Wangu Kanuri from Kenya and Godwin Asediba from Ghana are two of this years finalists for Thomsons Young Journalist of the Year Award. The pair are runners-up i...
04/12/2025
SVG Sit-Down: ProximaVision's Claudio Lisman on Why Tethered Drones Could Be...
04/12/2025
SVG Campus Shot Callers: Imry Halevi, Senior Associate Director of Athletics, Co...
04/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: LiveU Lightweight Sports Production: A Step Change in Spor...
04/12/2025
London to Riyadh: DAZN brings the boxing glamour to new production levels for Be...
04/12/2025
Analysis: Paramount bets on the battering ram' with Champions League play By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 10:12
Print ...
04/12/2025
Space City Home Network Launches SCHN DTC App for Astros and RocketsThe Rockets and Astros were previously the lone NBA and MLB teams without a DTC appBy Jason...
04/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: Content Workflows Workshop Spotlights Evolution of Spor...
04/12/2025
New Sponsor Spotlight: Geotech's Patrick Wambold On the Unreal Engine Revolu...
04/12/2025
Curt Gowdy Jr. - Master Storyteller, Nationally and RegionallyBy Jason Dachman, Editorial Director, U.S.
Thursday, December 4, 2025 - 1:52 pm
Print This Sto...
04/12/2025
(L-R) Rebecca Lichtenfeld, Mohammadreza Eyni, Sara Khaki, and Judith Helfand att...
04/12/2025
SBS launches Future Frames initiative to support emerging First Nations video ed...
04/12/2025
Coronal mass ejections caused by eruptions on the surface of the sun can have fa...
04/12/2025
Gracenote Content Connect enables media ecosystem to precisely align ad campaigns and programming based on rich content signals
NEW YORK - December 4, 2025 - N...
Arooj Aftabs Mohabbat Gets Presidential Nod The singer-songwriters track was listed on former President Barack Obamas 2021 summer playlist. 
