Alexian Santino Spinelli, musician, composer, writer, poet and university professor. The first Italian Roma to be appointed Commendatore of the Italian Republic for artistic and cultural merits. Spinelli with the Alexian Group holds numerous concerts in Italy and abroad. With his son Gennaro, he is the first Roma to have played at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan and at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples with the soloists of the Scala, the San Carlo and the G. Rossini Symphony Orchestra of Pesaro. He has played worldwide for Pope Benedict XVI and several times for Pope Francis. Founder and president of the cultural association Thèm Romanò, he is an ambassador of Romani culture in the world. His poem Auschwitz is on the Roma Memorial in Berlin inaugurated with Chancellor Angela Merkel. He currently teaches Romani Language and Culture at La Sapienza University in Rome.

Listen to the Alexian Group here and wherever you get music.

Romani crushes this episode are Raјko Đurić, Marcel Courthaid, Ian Hancock Esme Redzepova, Roby Lakatos, and Marian Serban.

Thank you for listening to Romanistan podcast.

You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook @romanistanpodcast, and on Twitter @romanistanpod. To support us, Join our Patreon for extra content or donate to Ko-fi.com/romanistan, and please rate, review, and subscribe. It helps us so much.

Follow Jez on Instagram @jezmina.vonthiele & Paulina @romaniholistic.

You can get our book Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling, online or wherever books are sold. Visit romanistanpodcast.com for events, educational resources, merch, and more. Please support our book tour fundraiser if you can.

Email us at romanistanpodcast@gmail.com for inquiries.

Romanistan is hosted by Jezmina Von Thiele and Paulina Stevens

Conceived of by Paulina Stevens

Edited by Viktor Pachas

With Music by Viktor Pachas

And Artwork by Elijah Vardo

Daughter of printmakers and painters – an English Romany father and Scottish-English-Irish mother – Lynn Hutchinson Lee is a multidisciplinary artist and writer based in Toronto, Canada. Lynn spent her childhood summers in a forest surrounded by marshes and bogs, and their lush beauty and magic haunt her writing. She was first place winner of the 2022 Joy Kogawa Award for Fiction. Her writing is published in Room; Weird Horror; Northern Nights; KIN: An Anthology of Poetry, Story and Art by Women from Romani, Traveller and Nomadic Communities; Prairie Fire’s 50 Over 50; Wagtail: The Romani Women’s Poetry Anthology; Guernica’s This Will Only Take a Minute (winning the Editor’s Choice Award); and elsewhere. She is co-editor of Through the Portal: Tales from a Hopeful Dystopia (Exile Editions). Following her novella Origins of Desire in Orchid Fens, her novel Nightshade, shortlisted for the Guernica Prize, will be released by Assembly Press in 2026.

No major spoilers about Origins of Desire in Orchid Fens, but we do discuss the plot at length from 26 mins-45 mins.

Romani crushes for this episode are Mihaela Drăgan of Giuvlipen and the late and great Ronald Lee.

Thank you for listening to Romanistan podcast.

You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook @romanistanpodcast, and on Twitter @romanistanpod. To support us, Join our Patreon for extra content or donate to Ko-fi.com/romanistan, and please rate, review, and subscribe. It helps us so much.

Follow Jez on Instagram @jezmina.vonthiele & Paulina @romaniholistic.

You can get our book Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling, online or wherever books are sold. Visit romanistanpodcast.com for events, educational resources, merch, and more. Please support our book tour fundraiser if you can.

Email us at romanistanpodcast@gmail.com for inquiries.

Romanistan is hosted by Jezmina Von Thiele and Paulina Stevens

Conceived of by Paulina Stevens

Edited by Viktor Pachas

With Music by Viktor Pachas

And Artwork by Elijah Vardo

Here's the edited release of Tales from Romanistan: A Night of Romani Storytelling, our first live show, in New Orleans, LA at Cafe Istanbul, 3/28/2025!

Hosted by Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele, Produced by Bimbo Yaga, Cast includes Tsarina Hellfire, Moonbear, Milly Raccoon, Bimbo Yaga, and our editor and musician, Viktor! Photos by Arian Aragon. Special thanks to our cast, crew, and everyone who attended! Special shoutout to the sweet couple who flew in from Ohio! And thank you to our sponsors for this event, Weiser Books and Emerald Comics Distro.

Jezmina's poem "White Caravan" first appeared in Zoeglossia.

Thank you for listening to Romanistan podcast.

You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook @romanistanpodcast, and on Twitter @romanistanpod. To support us, Join our Patreon for extra content or donate to Ko-fi.com/romanistan, and please rate, review, and subscribe. It helps us so much.

Follow Jez on Instagram @jezmina.vonthiele & Paulina @romaniholistic.

You can get our book Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling, online or wherever books are sold. Visit romanistanpodcast.com for events, educational resources, merch, and more. Please support our book tour fundraiser if you can.

Email us at romanistanpodcast@gmail.com for inquiries.

Romanistan is hosted by Jezmina Von Thiele and Paulina Stevens

Conceived of by Paulina Stevens

Edited by Viktor Pachas

With Music by Viktor Pachas

And Artwork by Elijah Vardo