WHAT I’VE LEARNED | Daniel Brunier, Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe, Rhône
Daniel Brunier is the co-owner of the benchmark Southern Rhône property, with his family also owning properties in Gigondas and Ventoux. On a recent visit to London to guide Members through a tasting of his family's wines, he told us of his love for Grenache, his concerns over the climate and the difficulty he has had in handing over responsibility to the next generation
‘We are a family. Today, there are five of us: me and my brother, Frédéric; then my son, Edouard, and my niece and nephew, Manon and Nicolas, the sixth generation. There’s a huge amount of trust involved. Without trust, you can’t achieve anything.’
‘During harvest time, all of us are responsible for the wines. We have three wineries – one in Châteauneuf, one in Gigondas and one in Bédarrides [in Ventoux], and we all switch between them. We don’t want people to be able to tell who was responsible for each wine. Yes, it’s a recipe for chaos, but we have a common philosophy.’
‘All of us in the family like the same wines. I can’t explain it, but when we are around the table, tasting blind, we all pick the same tank and say, "OK, this is Vieux Télégraphe; this is not. This is Vieux Télégraphe; this is not." There is no discussion. It was the same with my father. It's incredible.’
‘The hardest thing I’ve done in my career was to let go of things and give that responsibility to my son, niece and nephew. It has taken us about 10 years to arrive to a good balance, but now we have it. It sounds natural to have your son succeed you, but there was nothing natural about it to me.’
‘I had to understand that with me around, they couldn’t breathe. So I left completely. And when I left, that’s when they came to me and say, “Oh, we need you for this. We need you for that. You have to go to London. You know the market, you know the people there.” So I do it. But before that, for years and years, they didn't ask me anything.’
‘London is like the showroom of the wine world. It’s not as big a market for us as it used to be, but in terms of image, it’s a place where you simply have to be. Plus I love all the great restaurants, traditional hotels. My favourite these days is the Ham Yard – it’s not grand like the famous places in Mayfair, but they have a great art collection there.’
‘My brother Frédéric has a bit more difficulty in stepping back. He was in charge of the vineyards in the past. Now my son is now in charge, but they have different views. My son wants to take more risks.’
‘When he was 14, my son told me he wanted to leave home to learn about wine in a different region. So he went to Burgundy, then to Fattoria di Valiano, in Tuscany. It must be the rainiest place in the whole wine world – they get a metre of rain every year. But he wanted to be in the most difficult place to manage mildew, to learn how to cope with being organic. He came back wanting to do things as naturally as possible. He wants to save the planet. He is incredible.’
‘My brother has always run the vineyards organically, but we are not certified. But my son wants to go further. He is obsessed by grass, even more so than vines, because grass is good for the soil. So they fight, and sometimes I am the go-between. He’s my son, and I believe in him – he is very intelligent, very sensitive, and he believes in his philosophy. But he's [only] 30 years old. He will find his way.’
‘We have a vineyard consultant, for things like soil analysis and climate patterns, but not for winemaking. If you follow someone else’s advice in the cellar – good or bad – you lose your personality. It's not about quality, it's about identity. And the only way to stay competitive is to stay true to what makes you unique.’
‘My son’s biggest challenge in the next 20 years will be to maintain dry-farming. We are allowed to irrigate in Châteauneuf, but dry-farming is important to us because it's 100% of our identity. We have a soil that speaks so loudly, and if you irrigate it, you lose 100% of its personality – particularly the saltiness. Anyone can grow grapes. But no-one on the planet can create saltiness in a wine if you don’t have it in the grapes.’
‘In 25 years’ time, I want my son to be making a Vieux Télégraphe that tastes like the wine we're making today. I think it’s possible, but maybe the blend will be different – a bit more Cinsault, a bit more Clairette to compensate for the high alcohol of the Grenache.’
‘It's not like people started making very alcoholic wines yesterday. My father made a Vieux Télégraphe at 16% in 1962. The big deal is not the alcohol. The big deal is to how to manage the alcohol. You need that 15% for the Grenache, because without it, you don’t get the minerality or the salinity – nothing. But you need to manage it in the blend.’
‘People like 15% alcohol, but they don’t want to feel it in the mouth. Far better to feel it in the body, while thinking that you’re drinking a light and elegant wine. You feel happy when you drink a wine of 15%. We need wines like that with everything that is happening on the planet. If certain people drank more wine, we’d have less trouble.’
‘I’ve tasted one or two good Grenaches in other parts of the world – Priorat, Australia – and I'm very happy that Grenache has become fashionable. Grenache made us, and without it, we are nothing. It's the king of our region. But Grenache’s home is here in the Rhône.’
‘Look at Gigondas. The Grenache you make there, you can’t make in Châteauneuf. It's chocolatey, dense, opaque, big. In Châteauneuf, you have this mintiness, airiness, herbiness that you can’t find in Gigondas. I’ve made wine in Gigondas since 1998 and I’ve never achieved the same thing. It's impossible. But I’m happy about that – I don't want to make the same wine in both places.’
‘We are not fans of the Châteauneuf “special cuvées”. We don't want to create a special cuvée simply through oak, or extraction. A special cuvée should be special naturally. It should be there in front of you, and you taste it and say, “Oh yes, that’s something special”. If you extract it, you kill the identity, the blend. And in any case, we don’t need it. Vieux Télégraphe is respected. We don’t need to change that.’
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