The Barnham of Barolo presents the first edition of BING.

This is not a post about cherries or indeed about Barolo. It is about Best Italian Native Grapes: a two-day event organised by that Barnham of grape varieties, Ian D'Agata at Barolo, the capital of Nebbiolo.

We had never actually met Ian D'Agata despite going on about his marvellous book 'Native Grape Varieties of Italy' in these pages, so an ad. in 'Decanter' sparked the idea of attending BING and hopefully meeting the author.

With more than 300 wines drawn from Italian varieties to be tasted there was little risk we would not be there at this 1st 'edition.' There were other events too, one called 'Indigena' also founded  by D'Agata would be celebrating its second 'edition,' Indigena is for professionals only whereas the general public can and did attend BING in numbers.

Indigena is described as ' three non-stop days of guided tastings, seminars, conferences, state of the art lectures and winery visits.  “… a veritable think tank on the philosophy, principles and practices that are at the basis of the cultivars grown in various territories all over the world, not just Piedmont and Italy, as well as all those wines made in Italy and the rest of the world” (D'Agata).

Did we call D'Agata Barnham just now? Well, yes because he is also involved in a big festival in Barolo called 'Collisioni:'

'Collisioni is Italy’s largest music, literature and wine and food festival that celebrated its tenth birthday this year. A unique moment that happens in Barolo every year, where over the years ten Nobel Prize Literature winners, James Ellroy, Richard Ford, Atom Egoyan, James Ellroy, Jay McInerney, Bret Easton Ellis, Art Spiegelman, but also Sting, Elton John, Mark Knopfler, Bob Dylan, Patty Smith, Depeche Mode, Neil Young, Robbie Williams, Jamiroquay, Placebo, Deep Purple and many more fine artists have played.
Seven years, ago Ian D’Agata was asked to lead a wine program for Collisioni, as its location in barolo clearly emant that enogastronomy should also be part of the unique experience.'

D'Agata's has been writing and telling about wine for over 25 years. He is an Italian correspondent of the Chinese magazine TasteSpirit, Contributing Editor of Decanter and co-author for ten editions of the “Guide to the Best Italian Wines D’Agata & Comparini.”  He one of the first three founding members of the International Terroir Association at the Terroir Renaissance International Wine Symposium in Shangai inducted by none other than Aubert de Villaine, co-owner of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti. In addition, he has taught history of Italian food and wine culture at the master in “Food Sciences” of New York University, and wine marketing in several Italian universities. As a lecturer he is invited around the world to talk not only about native vines, but also about the relationship between wine and health.
 
Of special interest for this blog, he is actively involved in the recovery and rescue of ancient, almost extinct native vines with the aim of making them vinified again.

He also has a new book out this September.

In 'Native Wine Grapes of Italy, D'Agata sometimes refers to his 'scientific background' but you have to search quite a bit to discover hs ia actually a trained medical doctor specialized in pediatric gastroenterology and pediatric liver transplants who studied at Cincinnati, Harvard and Montreal universities, such is his modesty.

Meeting Ian was a real pleasure. Although pulled in a thousand directions on the first day of BING he had time to wecome us, chat a while, point us in the direction of wines of particular interest, introduce us to this and that producer and generally be the genial host. He was the same with everyone there.

We managed to attend a vertical tasting chared by Ian of Friulano wines from Schiopetto from 1992 - 2017. Our particular interest was due to the fact we had just planted a Friulano descendent, 'Soreli' ourselves - a resistant form of Friulano obtained by the Vivai Cooperativo Rauscedo (VCR).

Thanks to D'Agata's chairmanship of this event it became completely riveting, memorable for all kinds of reasons. Firstly Ian is a laugh-riot with a joke a minute. He called the room to order by imitating a lively fanfare. That did the trick. He is obviously supremely experienced in these events, simultaneously translating from the Italian for the benefit of the international audience of tasters, moving things along, picking out the salient facts, holding straw polls an generally creating a lively atmosphere. He is the universty lecturer one always hoped for an so rarely found. It helps that he has a large voice and clear delivery!

Of those salient facts which he drew from what otherwise might have seemed a routine event, here are a few;

1. Mario Schiopetto was the first to make a wine 100% from Friulano grapes which he did only in 1965.
2. He was the first to use temperature control in the area.
3. In the 1960s Italian white wine only lasted around 6 months before deteriorating. He illustrated this by asking the audience if anyone could remember a good Italian white wine dating back to before 1990 (nobody could).
4. Schiopetto can be described as the Father of the Italian White Wine Renaissance.
5. Along the way were apercus on the subject of native grape varieties in general. For example, he noted that most big producers get rid of old vines (old varieties) because they are not productive, Friulano hates water and bad results if it rains during the harvest.

D'Agata is also familiar with terroir (the subject of his next book) and discussed the Schiopettino vineyard in Capriva from personal knowledge.

All fantastically impressive and instructive as well as good fun.

We'll deal with the many Best Italian Native Grapes on show at BING in our next post.