2024 Morgon Côte du Py

Louis-Claude Desvignes is another producer in Villié-Morgon who is cruising at high altitudes. As usual, I met Louis-Benoît Desvignes and his sister, Claude-Emmanuelle, at the winery and tasted in their freezing-cold barrel room. I usually taste the most recent vintage in barrel plus random older vintages at this address. “The 2024 vintage was double the amount of work because of the rain, close to 1,100 mm, around 300-400 mm more than usual,” Louis-Benoît explains. “I think it was a little better [in Beaujolais] than in the Loire and Champagne. The biggest difficulty was finding windows to treat the vines, and the soils were hard to work. But we harvested a little more than 30 hl/ha in the end, which is a small victory. We learned from the 2021 vintage when it comes to the 2024.” This was an impressive line-up from Desvignes that reached its zenith with their stunning L’Impénitents bottling, another wine that testifies to the longevity that top Beaujolais wines derive from their enviable parcels of ancient vines.