2016 Brunello di Montalcino Riserva
$176 (2016)
Italy
Castelnuovo Dell'abate, Montalcino
Tuscany
Red
Sangiovese (2019 vintage)
00
2016
2024 - 2034
You'll Find The Article Name Here
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I met with Andrea Cortonesi, owner and winemaker of both Uccelliera and Voliero, on a sunny and dry July morning at his winery, right down the hill from the town of Castelnuovo dell’ Abate. This is a man who is a farmer and lover of the land before anything else; he’s also one of the most respected by all of the surrounding wineries in town. I watched him work through his garden, picking fresh produce and caring for each plant with precision and passion, the same that he shows upon his vines. With each step Cortonesi would take, his dog, Tirilla, would follow, slumping down into a sit position at every pause. When he asked if I wanted to see the vineyards, and with my answer being a quick and resolute “yes”, a priceless smile spread across his face from ear to ear. These are the moments that you really see the heart of a winemaker, motoring through their vineyards, willing to stop and dig in the soils, train vines with you and explain things in as much depth as you are willing to hear. However, it’s when you return to the winery and see that passion repeated amongst the barrels that you realize that you’re witnessing the total package. It suddenly became quite apparent why the wines of both Uccelliera and Voliero are so special from vintage to vintage.
Andrea Cortonesi farms holdings throughout the south of Montalcino, with the wines of Uccelliera being sourced entirely within the subregion of Castelnuovo dell’ Abate, and those of Voliero, coming from a combination of higher-elevation sights within Castelnuovo dell’Abate, as well as parcels in Sant’Angelo in Colle. Voliero is also refined in large oak casks for thirty months, versus the Uccelliera, which spends twenty-four months in a combination of French and Slavonian oak. As I’ve witnessed through much of Montalcino, Cortonesi has been using canopy management to try and offset the effects of warmer vintages, such as 2017. This difficult vintage also convinced him to use extended cryo maceration in the cellar (a way of breaking down the skins via ice crystals at subzero temperatures), as the berries in 2017 were small, thick-skinned and with very little juice. Even with all of the fruit that would have made up a Riserva added to the straight Brunello, production was still down by 25-30%. However, what Andrea Cortonesi created in 2017 is nothing short of magic. As I tasted through the range, I was in awe of how close to form both the wines of Uccelliera and Voliero were. Maybe a little richer and darker here, or maybe a bit juicier and immediate there, yet all together, excellent expressions of the vintage and southern Montalcino terroir. Hands down, these are among the finest wines of the vintage.
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