Behind the song: Mohamed Mounir’s Younis

Younis isn’t just a love song. Mohamed Mounir’s track, from his 2008 album Ta’m El Beyout, draws on the Hilali epic, Sirat Bani Hilal, the folk saga that poets have recited in Upper Egypt for centuries.

The lyrics are by Abdel Rahman El Abnoudi, the poet who spent years collecting the epic from village performers, with music by Mohamed Rahim and arrangement by Osama El Hindi.

In the epic, Younis is the young Hilali hero whose love story with the princess Aziza is one of its best-loved episodes.