Petr Benesch

"It was Jiří Šosvald, who gave the motive for it, Jaroslav Velínský, called Captain Kid, who wrote a lot of songs. He's often in the pictures because I recorded about seven CDs or records for him. We were great friends. They supported Porta at that time. In 1967 it was going all right, in 1968 it was completely free. In 1969 and 1970 it was still going on in Ústí and then the Bolsheviks banned it. So we moved. The whole Porta moved and Karviná took us under its wing. In 1971 it was in Karviná. The next year it was banned there, so Sokolov, a mining town, took it on its shoulders."

"My mother was one of seven siblings, two sisters were killed in the concentration camp and the others lived in America and Canada. My mother's best childhood friend was Helena, née Peroutková, a well-known name, and she married Otokar Hůlka. He and Ferdinand Peroutka housed Czechs in New York who had emigrated. So she was my mother's best friend. She corresponded with her all the time, she even came here when she could, she was retired. She went to Prague, to Bohemia, to Vienna, she and my mother met everywhere. My mother's sisters used to come here too. So there was always contact with abroad. Somehow we didn't like communism very much."