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A pox of the fooling and the plotting of late,
What a pother and stir has it kept in the State?
Let the rabble run mad with suspicions and fears;
Let’em scuffle and far till they go by the ears;
Their grievances never shall trouble my pate
So I can but enjoy my dear bottle at quiet.
In 1680 a ‘person-of-quality’ wrote The Claret Drinker’s Song complaining about the stoppage of Bordeaux wine exports to England and cursing “the members and makers of laws” for making his “claret so dear.”
The new fangled Port market – which began around this time – was further aided by the War of the Spanish Succession and the Treaty of Methuen in 1703. English consumers – forced through preferential trade and punitive taxation on claret – would enjoy the novelty of dark concentrated blackstrap wines bolstered with a fair alcoholic kick. Some years later these wines would come in the first cylindrical bottles stoppered with corks. 425 years on the ‘persons-of-quality’ are still complaining about change.
Perversely – and mirroring the early vintages of Grange – the Bordeaux wines of Gerard Persse especially Chateau Pavie have been accused of being over-alcoholic and like dry port. At around $600 a bottle for the latest 2005 en primeur release, it is an argument that few people have the luxury to buy into.
Once upon a time the fine wine market was seemingly ordered. Bordeaux was king, Burgundy consort and Port was the jack of spades. New World wine was the joker in the pack. In 1976 in Paris legendary and urbane wine educator Stephen Spurrier put on a blind tasting of New World wines against the traditional bastions of wine connoiseurship. The results rocked the establishment causing a seismic shift in perception and the irrevocable entrée of California into the fine wine club. In 1985 a visit to Australia by a group of Masters of Wine further created positive impetus for ultra-fine New World wine.
The issue of authenticity lies at the heart of almost every fine wine debate. Snobbery, fear of change and vested interest are deeply rooted in this concept. Real and imagined concerns have been used as ‘weapons of doubt’ for centuries in the pursuit of market dominance. Tradition and reputation – deserved or not – are completely central to the argument. Yet time, confidence, cross pollination of wine investment and the evolution of ideas and technology can breakdown barriers. As with Port in the eighteenth century, Barossa Shiraz and Napa Valley Cabernet are now considered as authentic and classical wines. Wines with brettanomyces, cork seals, dead fruit character, residual sugar, over ripeness, under ripeness, green tannins, over use of oak, unfamiliar nuances, unpopular names, Robert Parker Jr. points, to name a few, are in danger of being inauthentic.
A few years ago the highly eccentric and lateral thinking winemaker Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon pronounced the death of cork much to the glee of wine writers around the world. While many consumer-focused New World producers have adopted screw cap and other ilk technology the top producers in Bordeaux and Burgundy appear to have ignored this innovation completely. Perhaps the risk of uncertainty is considered a better option than the risk of destroying the authenticity of the wine experience. Notwithstanding the very real incidence of cork taint, the lengthy and tedious sermons – fine wine buyers seem to accept the risk of TCA and random oxidation as a fact of life. Is it possible for instance that the pleasure of drinking a bottle of Chateau Margaux is all the more exquisite and authentic as a result of beating the odds? In New York Christie’s recently sold a 12 bottle case of 1978 Romanée-Conti Grand Cru, Domaine de la Romanée Conti for US$170,375. The incidence of cork taint runs at roughly 12%. It appears that the more people pay for wine the less sensitive they are to risk as long as basic provenance is known.
Uncertainty is the alter ego of authenticity. As an original protagonist of the Penfolds Recorking Clinics and longtime observer of its effect on the secondary wine market, I believe that it is better to have a wine topped up and recorked than to have an ullaged bottle with a failing cork. Yet there are many people who believe that topping up destroys the genuine authenticity and character of aged wine. At auction buyers are certainly more risk averse to bottles presented with low levels. In Australia, at least, it can point to past cellaring problems. Yet cliniced bottles of Penfolds will attract pretty much exactly the same prices as those in original and perfect condition. This is a fine example of showing how a market reacts to intellectual debate. It’s all about numbers. While screw capped wine attracts increasing support, critical mass still favours cork. A major debacle needs to happen to create major change in this sector of the market. Is an entire vintage of Chateau Latour or Mouton Rothschild ever likely to have an unacceptable and very public level of cork taint?
The fine wine market is an evolving beast. It lives in the context of light and shade and ever changing seasons of perceptions, debate and interest. Even so, great vintages can only be gauged by the contrast, character and quality of lesser years. Yet some wine producers in Australia choose to release their flagship wine only in better vintages. While it results in consistency in both quality and style prescriptive and formulaic winemaking can flaunt authenticity through imbalance of nature and nurture.
Homogenisation is the inevitable result of an overly technical outlook or homage to a single opinion. In this less ordered world of fine wine the excitement is in the pursuit of perfection and beauty. Without flaw, risk and uncertainty – the flip side of wine collecting – there is no real appreciation of difference, authenticity or individual difference. It may explain why high prices in wine can actually create demand. After all there is nothing more attractive to a wine collector than a sure thing. Pity about the taxes though… and death.
Andrew Caillard, MW
Reprinted with permission from WINE MAGAZINE
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