A Content-Based Analysis of Jamshid Najafi ’ s Azerbaijani Turkish Songs Tested Against Linguistic and Literary Themes

Jamshid Najafi is an Iranian Azerbaijani Turkish and Farsi singer. The present study aims to analyze some of his songs in terms of literary themes. The corpus of the current study is Jamshid Najafi’s Azerbaijani Turkish songs released by the permission of the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. Moreover, a content-based analysis approach is used to analyze the corpus. The analysis of the data shows that Najafi is a romantic singer whose Azerbaijani Turkish songs are replete with romantic images as well as themes. Mother is the next frequent theme found in Jamshid Najfi’s works. It shows that mother has a holy position in Azerbaijani culture. Criticism of life and nostalgic themes are the next themes found in the studied corpus. Sister, child, homeland, devotee and religion are other common themes in Jamshid Najafi’s songs that show the importance of these themes to his life and ideology.


Introduction
Jamshid Najafi (Azerbaijani Turkish: Cəmşid Nəcəfi) is an Iranian Azerbaijani Turkish and Farsi singer.He was born in a religious family in Iran in 1950.His mother is from Ardabil, I. R. Iran and his father is from Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.His first practice of singing was in religious ceremonies like the commemoration of Imam Husain (a.s.).For instance, Jamshid Najafi depicted in figure 1. took part and sang in ceremonies of the Day of Ashura that is commemorated by the Shias all around the world including Iran as a day of mourning for the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of Muhammad Prophet (P.B. U. H.), at the Battle of Karbala.
Figure 1.Jamshid Najafi performing in Ardabil, 2013 Jamshid Najafi was introduced to radio in 1972 by his friend Firooz Berenjian.His songs are in Azerbaijani Turkish and Farsi.Since he started his career as a singer, he has released many albums.His works can be divided into some categories.His best works relate to his songs released after 1979 and they can be seen in some classifications.Some of them are dedicated to his homeland, the Islamic Revolution of Iran or religion such as Xələbanlar (pilots), Ey Rahbar (oh Leader), Ya Mola Ali (Oh Master Ali (a.s.)), Ya Mohammad (oh Muhammad), Hamsangar (fellow traveler), Rooze Mowud (the Promised Day), Allah Akber (Allah is Great) etc. Jamshid Najafi's well-populated works include Xələbanlar (i.e., devoted to Iranian pilots that was released in 1982 during the 8 years of imposed war between Iran and Iraq), Gecələr (i.e., Najafi's most noted and well-known song that has a romantic theme), Gəldi Baba (devoted to his daughter), among others.

Significance of the Study
Azerbaijani Turkish songs have not been studied by scholars very much on the one hand and the fact that Jamshid Najafi's works have not been considered from the viewpoint of scholars despite the fact that his works have gained considerable attention in the past decades which encouraged the authors of this study to conduct the current research.

Research Question
This study seeks to answer the following research question: What are the main themes found in Jamshid Najafi's Azerbaijani Turkish songs?

Methodology
A content-based analysis method is used to analyze the corpus which consists of the Jamshid Najafi's songs.

Corpus
This study aims to analyze Jamshid Najafi's Azerbaijani Turkish works released by a permission issued by the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance.The mentioned corpus consists of 5 albums or 25 songs.

Analysis
After considering the albums of Jamshid Najafi, the main themes of his works have been obtained using a contentbased analysis approach.Then, they are shown in relevant tables and are discussed in details.

Jamshid Najafi's Works
Jamshid Najafi's Azerbaijani Turkish works are Axşamlar (evenings),Gecələr (nights),Gəldi Baba (dad came) and Neyniyim (I do not know what to do).A brief summary of themes found in the mentioned albums are given in the following.
Neynim: This song is a romantic song.
Yadigar: It is a nostalgic song that talks about the cloud in the mountain and changing of spring into fall and shows that the singer is brother-less (helpless).The singer is alone and nobody greets him.
Həmdəm: It is about the romantic relationship between the poet and his beloved.
Gözəl Ceyran: It is about the poet's beloved.It shows his beloved is his religion, Faith and his second god.She is like a home or like blood inside the vessel of the poet.It depicts that the poet will die if he misses his beloved like a fish that dies on soil: Published by IDEAS SPREAD Ağardı Saçım: The unfaithfulness of his beloved has been criticized by the poet since her unfaithfulness caused his hair go grey.The poet writes: Cavanam ömrüm keçdi ağardı açım/Bivəfa yar əlindən mən hara qaçım, I am young, my life is passing and my hair goes grey/ to where can I go since my beloved is unfaithful.The poet believes that he is alone in this world.This song is a romantic song since it says '… Səni bir gün görməsəm inan ölərəm', in a case I do not see you (the singer's beloved), I will die.
Ana: It is about the poet's mother.It shows that his mother is like his eyesight.It talks about the lullaby that the singer's mother has played to him.
Nə Qaldı: This song is about the unfaithfulness of this world.It says that just God is eternal.
As far as what is mentioned, a brief summary of themes found in Neyniyim are shown in table 1 1 shows that romance, criticism of life and mother are the main themes of Jamshid Najafi's Neyniyim album.
Gecələr: This song is the most well-known song of Jamshid Najafi.It is about the dark night that the singer is exhausted.This song shows the long nights that he cannot sleep.He says that my star (beloved) has been sulked and has been blown like wind and has terminated his life.The singer believes that the odor of morning is meaningless without his beloved.The complete verses with English translation can be found in the following:

Gecələr
Gəlmə qaranlıq gecələr, An important point is that there is a harmony among the voice and music in this song.In this paper, just the poetry will be analyzed.Some beautiful images and collocations that are used in this poem are: Neynirəm (which is translated as I do not want) is a word (and also is a sentence as it is seen in the translation given by the writers since Turkish is an agglutinative language) that has some implied meanings and senses in addition to its literal meaning that cannot be transferred by translating it into English.It signifies a kind of sulking that the poet has not mentioned directly.In other words, he does not want the smell of morning without his beloved when he recites Səhərin ətrin neynirəm ən iz with a special stress on both neynirəm and ən iz.When neynirəmcollocates with sənsiz (without you), it transfers a feeling that the poet requests his beloved to come earlier.These implied meanings and senses which cannot be translated into English are hidden in Gecələr.Another important point about this poem is the crying of poet's chance to his burning eyes.This verse adds more beauty to the poem with its unique imaginative image.Another rare image seen in this poem is in Ulduzum kü üb gedib, Yel kimi ə ib gedib / My tar i ulked and ha left me, It ha bl wn like the wind.
Qənari: This song is about a canary that has been raised by the singer and it has been flown away and his cage is empty now.
Bahar Gəldi: This song is about welcoming spring and also about singer's child.
Qızıl gül: This song is a romantic piece of work that shows some beautiful images like: Atma məni:This is a romantic song.
Gözəl Balam: This song is about singer's child who is in travel and he misses him/her.He remembers his child and his memories when he looks at roses.

Ana (Təbriz):
This song is about mother and homeland.The poet talks about homesickness and his deep sorrow of separation from the Iranian city of Tabriz (his native soil).The song is about El-Gölü (also known as Şah-Gölü which is one of the beautiful parks with traditional architecture of Iranian Azerbaijan located in Tabriz) and lack of həmzəban (a native speaker According to the themes reported in table 2, romance is the most frequent theme in Gecələr album of Jamshid Najafi.Also his child is the next frequent theme.
Gəldi Baba: This song is one of the most well-known songs of Jamshid Najafi.He sings to his daughter.His love toward his daughter can be seen in this song.Gəldi Baba and its translation can be seen in the following: Father and mother are shelter for their child, God is shelter for all people, Child is like a bud, mother is like a gardener, Father is like a kind human.

Güldərən
This song is a romantic song.

Ana
This song is devoted to mother's status that occupies a holy position in all cultures including Azerbaijani culture.
Do not pull the fishnet through the sea, Taking lives of fish by human is not fair.

Biganə
This song is about faithfulness of a devotee that will not quit his homeland as it can be seen in the following: İgid oğlan elin atmaz dostunu namərdə satmaz, Qurbət ölkə beheşt olsa vətən toprağına çatmaz.
A devotee does not leave his homeland, he is faithful to his friend, He does not forget his homeland even if the foreign country is like heaven.
The significance of devotee can be seen in Azerbaijnai poems on the one hand and in Azerbaijani proverbs on the other hand as reported by Shahiditabar and Setayesh (2015).

Səfay-i Bahar
This song is welcoming spring.

Məcnun:
This song is about singer's love that has no helper except God.He depicts himself as Majnoon.Majnoon is a romantic character extracted from LEYLI O MAJNUN.According to iranicaonline.org,LEYLI O MAJNUN is a romantic narrative poem of approximately 4,600 lines composed in 584/1188 by the famous poet Neẓāmi of Ganja.It is the third of Neẓāmi of Ganja five long narrative poems known collectively as the Ḵam a (the Quintet).
Mənim Ağam: This song is one of the songs that shows the singer's (and poet's) dedication to Imam Reza (a.s.) as we can see: According to what is presented, summary of the themes found in Gəldi Baba can be seen in table 3.As it is seen in table 3, romance and family (mother/child) are the most frequent themes found in Gəldi Baba.

Gəlin Bacı
This song is a romantic poem.It shows the cultural significance of sister's position in Turkish custom.It says that Sən bu evin çırağı an, inan qəlbim ən iz yatar,Y u are the light f thi h u e, believe me, my heart will t p w rking if y u leave me al ne.

Çağır Məni
This romantic song is about separation of the poet from his beloved as he writes:

Toyun Mubarək
As the name suggests in Azerbaijani, this work is a happy birthday song.

My beloved left me unannounced, she broke my heart,
To whom my beloved addressed me in this faithless world.

Gecələr
This is another romantic song that its name echoes Najafi's most well-known song.This song is different from his other song with the same name.It starts with: Yalvarıram səhərə açmaki yar gələcək,...I ask the sun not to rise since the beloved is going to come, ...

Xələbanlar
This is an epic piece of art dedicated to Iran's Army during the 8-years of imposed war between Iraq and Iran.This song was released in 1981.This song is bilingual (Farsi-Azerbaijani Turkish).The Azerbaijani Turkish part of the song is seen in thefollowing lines: Vırışırlar ərtişimiz həryanda, Göy üzündə dəryalarda dağlarda.Long life with our army, Allah saves you.

Şirin Və Fərhad
This song is a romantic song as its name suggests.This song is about Shirin and Farhad.Farhad is a romantic figure in Iran's legend and literature according to iranicaonline.org.Farhad is best known from the poetry of Neẓāmī Ganjavī as a rival with the Sasanian King Ḵosrow II Parvēz (r.591-628) for the love of the beautiful Armenian princess Šīrīn.
A brief summary of themes found in Axşamlar can be seen in table 4. As it can be seen, romance is the most paramount theme found in this album.

Discussion
Regarding what is mentioned about Jamshid Najafi's songs, following themes with frequencies can be shown: üstə ölərəm.Oh do not leave my heart, I do not know what to do after you, I will die after you like a fish out of water.Ana Mən Qəribəm: It is about ana (mother) and bacı (sister).The poet criticizes life for putting him into solitude.He addresses his mother/sister and complains about his homelessness/poorness.The poet uses some rare images to describe his complaints which are seen below: Bizim dağda maral gəzər, Dırnaxların daşlar əzər, Mənə vırıb düşmən nəzər.Qızıl gül kimi solmuşam, Ana dünyadan doymuşam.Deer is in our mountains, Stones crush its nails, My enemy has pointed to me, I am wilting like a rose, Oh mother, I am tired of life.
mehrəban insane.Oh my adorable daughter, my beautiful sweetie, Open the door, daddy has come, daddy has come, Put your arms around my neck, Oh my tired soul is dedicated to you, Open the door, daddy has come, daddy has come, You are the torch and brightness of my house, You are leaf and bough of heart, If you are not (alive), I do not want life anymore, You are the hope and pillar of my heart.Published by IDEAS SPREAD You are, you are my world, life and dream.

…
Ahunu balasına yetirən qərib ağa, Dəxiləm dərgahinə gələ o əziz bala… … I ask the Master who helped the deer to reach to its baby to help me find my baby … According to iranicaonline.org,Imam Reza (a.s.) or ALĪ AL-REŻĀ, ABU'L-ḤASAN B. MŪSĀ B. JAʿFAR, is the eighth Imam of the Emāmī Shiʿites.He was born and grew up in Medina.The year of his birth is variously given as 148/765, 151/768, and 153/770.
, an Azerbaijani poet who honored Artist of the Azerbaijan SSR (1943) and reintroduced medieval ghazelstyle in Azerbaijani poetry in Baku as: Düşəndə türre-i dilbər xəyala axşamlar, Məhəbbət əhli düşər min məlalə axşamlar.When the hair of beloved falls in dreams, The lovers fall in thousands of boredoms in the eveningsVahid (2006).
, Allah sizə yar olsun.Our army is fighting everywhere, In the sky, in the sea and in the mountains.They do not divert from the truth and the religious path, To the best of their lives.Oh pilots, your are the pride of our land.Oh pilots, .... Fly, Fly. .
).It says that my heart is beating for Tabriz.The song shows that Ana and Tabriz are equal.Published by IDEAS SPREAD According to what is mentioned, relevant themes found in Gecələr can be seen in table 2.

Table 5 .
Themes found in Jamshid Najafi's Works