German Catalog 2006 USE THIS ONE.qxp - Michael Skurnik Wines

140
rheingau wines
Recently Jancis Robinson included the Rheingau in a group of regions which had become “less
interesting” since the last edition of Hugh Johnson’s Wine Atlas. They say by the time
Hollywood picks up on a trend it’s already passé. Similarly perhaps, by the time an idea gains
general currency in the wine-world it’s already growing outdated. No disrespect to the wonderful
Ms. Robinson, who’s one of the Greats of our time! But when I first wrote about the
Rheingau’s malaise it was, what 1985? And now, finally, there are the first little stirs and twitters
heralding, dare one hope, a comeback.
What an irony. There’s almost no call any more for “Rheingau” as a commodity. It took a generation
of indifferent and downright crummy wines from most of the erstwhile Great names of the
region to throttle its reputation to death. I find I have to defend my selections, of which I am as
proud and happy as I am with all my offerings. And some of the Great Names are staging a comeback!
Prinz von Hessen is said to be much improved. Von Simmern’s getting there. We have quite
a way to go still, but one can no longer simply write-off
the Rheingau.
The tragic suicide of Erwein Matuschka-Greifenclau
(erstwhile proprietor of Vollrads) was, perhaps, a
Though things are discernibly better
now, there’s still distressingly little
buzz about the region.
wake-up call. Something needed to change, and
designer bottles were not the answer. The emperor had
been naked long enough, and the pathetic spectacle
could no longer be ignored.
A certain prevailing hauteur may have prevented
the truth from being heard. But the financial ruin of a
600-year old business could no longer be ignored, and a
regional epidemic of denial was drawing to a close. Now,
we may hope, the idealists will no longer be suffocated.
Or so we may hope!
We still gotta do something about those prices. I’m
just not sure what. Perhaps Mr. Leitz will consent to
being cloned. There’s an historic precedent for Rheingau
wines to price themselves, ahem “aristocratically,” which
might have been justified thirty years ago but which has
zero bearing on their real value or cost of production visà-vis
other German wines. Of all the habits that die hard,