"It was both a great honour and a pleasure to be invited to represent the Roma Support Group at your reception held to listen to the guitar of Harri Stojka. The virtuosity with which he places his own stamp on tunes and motifs from other Romani performance traditions, and interaction with world music stands at the heart of the confluence of widely separated Romani traditions happening in our lifetime. Particularly intriguing was deconstruction of the tune "Summertime" from "Porgy and Bess", an African-American re-telling of the story of Carmen. The variations which Mr Stojka played seemed to take us back from the American South to the music of Bizet, and the novel of Prosper Merimee, and to the Cale Roma of the 19th century, forced by urbanisation into factory labour, or marginalisation - or entertaining Gaje. Almost unbearably clever and thought-provoking! And side-stepping the stereotyping projected by European audiences onto Carmen!“