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New edition of a classic: very flawed, especially in the Germany section.

"That son of a bitch is always right", Roald Dahl is supposed to have said once about Robert M. Parker Jr. according to the publisher's press release, whose new, old book will be the subject here. That is doubly wrong! Firstly, Parker is not a bastard and secondly, he is not always right.

Nevertheless, the wine world has of course been eagerly awaiting this recently published book - and the publisher's advertising is right about that - because these ratings, whether right or wrong, are of course a yardstick for many wine buyers. Whether it is actually always wine lovers and connoisseurs who follow this advice, and not just devout disciples of a guru, remains to be seen.

Of course, one cannot judge such a 2,000-page tome conclusively after a few hours of reading. The true quality of the book will only become apparent in the course of time, if one works with it continuously. And work with it you will have to; for there is no comparable compendium on the wines of the world. And that alone makes it indispensable.

Thinking of Germany at night....

Let's start with the worst mistakes in the book. They are on pages 1295 to 1306 and are headed with the word "Germany". In view of the hair-raising nonsense that follows, the "German Winegrowers' Association" and the DWI should consider whether it is not time to sue Parker for counterstatement and correction. I may be a legal layman, but I have been responsible for magazines as editor-in-chief several times in my professional career and can only say that this manuscript would not have crossed my desk in the first place because of serious press law concerns. There are rows and rows of demonstrably false factual allegations and they are linked with business-damaging evaluations. In my view, some of them amount to defamation and disparagement of entire professional groups. I say this although I agree with Parker on many points in his fundamental criticism of the German wine law and the way it has been and is practised. Only here he goes too far and, on top of that, completely ignores the positive developments since 1990. Conclusion: The man obviously does not know what he is talking about.

Publicity:
Einer der preiswertesten Shops für Tee und Kräuter

What are we to make of a rating list of German goods (from ** for average to ***** for excellent) in which even the names of the businesses mentioned are distorted in a grotesque way. As if the author had not even been able to copy the labels of the wines tasted correctly. Examples? Schloss Johannishoff instead of Schloss Johannisberg or Epenschild instead of Espenschied.

The time from which such findings and evaluations originate can be seen from how outdated the information they contain is. Gunderloch is still called Gunderloch-Usinger, a double name that last appeared on a label in 1986. Schloss Groenestyn is still listed with two stars, although it ceased production in the mid-90s, as did Siegfried Gerhard. In other respects, too, there's a mix-up of cabbage and turnips - König Victoriaberg belongs to Deinhard in Parker's list. The winery of the VDP president Salm appears twice, once correctly as Prinz zu Salm and once quite modestly as Salm. One could extend this list at will.

As far as the ratings are concerned, one can of course argue endlessly. But one thing is certain: the proportions are really not right. The winegrowers' cooperative "Vier Jahreszeiten" in Bad Dürkheim is certainly one of the better cooperatives, but the fact that it is rated higher (namely as good) than the Hessian State Wine Estates, Schloss Vollrads and von Buhl, to which Parker only attests average quality, is simply ridiculous and annoying. Likewise the three stars for the Rheingau cask-wine vintner Gebrüder Grimm, whom he puts on the same level as Dr. Heger, Wittmann and Dr. Pauly-Bergweiler.

Parker uses the problematic 1987 vintage as a reference to illustrate the "general level of quality" in Germany. How long this book has not been thoroughly revised can be seen elsewhere, namely where Parker describes the most important German grape varieties. Müller-Thurgau, he says, is still the most important variety. 25% of the area is planted with it. That was once a long time ago. Today, Riesling is number one with 20.8 % and MT number two with 19.8 %, followed by Pinot Noir with 9.5 % and not Silvaner as Parker claims. How can you believe someone who researches such simple details so sloppily?

Here are three more samples to amuse and annoy you:

Parker on Pinot Noir: "The German Pinot Noir grape unfortunately often produces a grotesque rather awful wine that tastes about like a failed, sweet, tired and diluted red Burgundy from an incompetent winemaker."

Parker's verdict on dry German wines: "Dry wines tend to be dull and thin. They have little body and aromas and flavours. Semi-dry wines also taste dry, but may have a little more residual sugar and are a wee bit more interesting. I rarely recommend either: They are commercial products that benefit from the growing preference for 'dry wines'"

Parker on German sparkling wines: "They also produce sparkling wines in Germany called German Sekt, but they should be reserved for convinced masochists because they are rather gruesome concoctions of excessively sulphured wines."

The producers of hand-riddled and bottle-aged vintner's sparkling wines should actually file a class action lawsuit for libel against the last sentence in an American court. They would have a good chance of winning and relieving the consumer advocate of a few million in damages.

Of course, the whole thing is particularly embarrassing because only a few months ago Parker and Rovani praised the German Rieslings of the 2001 vintage to the skies in their wine letter "The Wine Advocate" and this is not mentioned in a single word. The news "100 Parker points for German Riesling Eiswein" went through all the gazettes and reached a very wide audience. At the end of 2002, it would certainly still have been technically possible to make such changes or to remove this outdated chapter altogether.

Tu felix Austria

The situation is quite different in neighbouring Austria. And this brings us to the better pages of this book. The 24 classified producers are all written correctly and there is nothing to complain about in the selection: Hirtzberger, Knoll, Kracher, F.X. Pichler and Prager as the 5 - star top. Behind them: Bründlmayer, Feiler-Artinger, Hiedler, Hirsch, Nikolaihof, Nigl, R. Pichler, Gebrüder Polz, Heidi Schröck, Tement, Alzinger, Dinstlgut, FWW, Gross, Jamek, Loimer, Salomon-Undhof, E. Triebaumer, Wieninger. The detailed ratings of the 1999 vintage have been much discussed elsewhere. But the top scores of 90 to 95 + for the best Smaragde from the Wachau are quite acceptable, as are the scores of up to 98 points for the Kracher collections of 1997 and 1998.

What progress! In the last edition of this book, Austria still consisted exclusively of a chapter on the sweet wine specialist Alois Kracher. Incidentally, the introductory chapter on Austria is full of the highest praise and free of any polemics. Quote: "The best Austrian Rieslings leave you speechless in a way that no other dry wine produced anywhere in the world can." A bit exaggerated for my taste, but tending to be correct, of course. Even if I often prefer Grüner Veltliner in a direct comparison.

Bordeaux, Bordeaux above all

The first half of the book is devoted in great detail to France: Alsace, Bordeaux, Burgundy and Beaujolais, Champagne, the Loire, Languedoc-Rousillon, Provence, the Rhône, Bergerac and the Southwest. I would like to single out the Bordelais as representative. Parker describes the wines of this region on 305 pages, in detail, comprehensibly, competently. He knows his way around, he is at home there. You can tell. Here the book is on a level that one can expect from one of the world's leading wine critics. For this is and remains Parker, despite all the criticism I made of him at the beginning.

I have participated in wine tastings with Parker several times. So I know from my own experience that he is one of the very great and disciplined tasters. His problem is called Rovani. And thank God he is not responsible for Bordeaux. But he is responsible for Germany and Italy, which we will talk about later.

In the Bordeaux chapter, the vintages of the 90s from 1995 to the milennium vintage 2000 have been updated. For the first time, the up-and-comers and one-hit-wonders, the mini-selections and boutique wines that mushroomed at the end of the 1990s, especially on the right bank and in the marginal appellations, are documented with their beginnings in a halfway complete manner: Branda, Branon, Cambon La Pelouse, Cap de Faugeèes, Clos Badon, Clos Dubreuil, Croix de Labrie, Gracia, Magrez-Fombrauge, La Fleur Morange, La Fleur Mongiron, La Gomerie, Les Grands Maréchaux, Griffe de Cap d'Or, Haut Condissas Prestige, L`Hermitage Lezongars, Marjosse, Marojallia, Marsau, La Mondotte, Pas de L`Ane, Péby-Faugères, Quinault L`Enclos, Roc de Cambes, Rol Valentin etc. Some of them are almost forgotten today, others are well on the way to becoming classics.

For many, this alone is probably worth the purchase. On the other hand, you can wait until Parker's next Bordeaux book appears. Then you will get it even more up-to-date and detailed.

By the way, compared to the last edition, Parker has downgraded Clinet, Lagrange and La Fleur de Gay from the top group of his five-star estates and upgraded six new ones: Péby-Faugères, Pavie, Pavie-Macquin, Pape Clement, Monbousquet and Magrez Fombrauges. In the foreword, he once again repeats his sustained plea for the 2000 vintage, which he considers to be "the best Bordeaux ever produced". Bordeaux, for him, is "the epitome of high-quality wine that can be stored for a long time." It's hard to disagree with him.

A friend, a good friend

In his general foreword, Parker writes about the role of the wine critic: "I buy over 75% of the wines I taste myself. Never have I asked for samples, but I do not think it immoral to accept samples sent to my office unsolicited." A tricky sentence. Quite apart from the fact, of course, that he does not have to pay a single cent for a single barrel sample, for example, at the primeur campaigns in Bordeaux or otherwise on one of his numerous trips. Like all other wine critics, he gets them for free. Of course, he has tasted most of the old vintage rarities - like all other authors - as a guest of producers or at rarity tastings mostly organised by private collectors or by merchants. Nor are these samples sent to him quite by chance and casually. That may have been the case in the past. According to the information available to me, they are requested quite normally and quite correctly by his office from the importers. So far, so good.

A few sentences further on it says about his relationship with the trade "In order not to lose one's independence, it is imperative to maintain a certain distance from the trade." Now, it is an open secret that Parker is good friends with some American traders and importers, which, incidentally, I find nothing objectionable about. I also count some traders I have known for a very long time among my personal friends and would not want to miss them. And I argue much more critically and passionately about the quality of their wines with producer friends than with those who mean nothing to me personally.

If one reads a chapter like Australia under this premise, however, one finds indications that the lawyer occasionally does not take his distance from the trade very seriously. Some of the highest-scoring wines simply escape the scrutiny of international wine critics because only Parker gets to taste these miracle wines before they are released, such as Chris Ringland's Three Rivers, Greenock Creek's Roennefeldt Road or Wild Duck Creek's Duck Muck. Coincidentally, these wines usually get 100 or at least a (bashful) 99 points. As it happens, they always come from the portfolio of the same merchant clique. Coincidentally, they have exclusive distribution worldwide, but the wines are sold against the rules of the game almost exclusively in the USA at sinfully expensive prices (300 dollars for the Three Rivers) directly to end consumers via mailing lists. It may be that the lawyer knows nothing about all this. But I find this hard to believe.

Incidentally, Parker restricts himself almost entirely to red wines in Australia, which I find a pity. He doesn't even mention Penfolds' Yatarna Chardonnay and the best Australian Rieslings (Grosset) are only mentioned in passing. The focus of his picture of Australia are the Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon varieties. I have also tasted about 80 percent of the wines he describes and agree in the vast majority of cases, often by one or two points lower. But it's a parallel roughly equal score. If you have read this chapter, you are really well informed for this sector of the wine world and you will hardly be able to discover anything new.

Parker's top scores for Australian sweet wines, on the other hand, should not be taken too seriously if you have a tongue trained on German and Austrian TBAs, ice wines, Hungarian Tokays, Rust eruptions Central European.

Italia assurda or the courage to leave a gap.

The 235 pages on the wines of Italy belong to the absurd chapters of this book for me. Up to now, they have been the playground of the Parker adlatus Pierre-Antoine Rovani. In future, they will probably be reviewed by Daniel Thomases, who recently joined the Parker team. Thomases, who reported from Italy for the Wine Spectator from 1990 to 1997, has lived in the country for many years and knows his way around. Gaps like those in the current book will perhaps no longer exist in the future.

Certainly, it is difficult to taste the Italian variety to a certain extent. In Piedmont, one has the impression that Rovani even looked into the last milk jug in the village to find out whether there might still be a drinkable Barolo or Barbaresco in there. Other regions, on the other hand, show serious gaps. One quickly gets the impression that he knows every micorcuvée, no matter how small, e.g. from Voos dai Ciamps (600 cases) or Refosco and Pignolo from Moschioni (200 cases).

Avignonesi is listed with its Vino Nobile among the excellent 4-star wineries, but the wines themselves do not appear - neither the Desiderio, which is one of the best red wines in this part of Italy, nor the Occhio de Pernice, which (not only ) for me is counted among the world's top ten sweet wines and beats every 100-per-case sweet wine from Australia by far.

These are by no means just any wines that have been "forgotten". It is weighty and great wines that one looks for in vain, such as the excellent San Leonardo from Trentino, Masi's Amarone Campolongo di Torbe or Serego Aligheri's Vajo Amaron - both classics of the Veneto. La Poderina from Montalcino? No chance. Neither the Brunello Riserva nor the sweet Muscat, which many connoisseurs consider the best wine of its kind in Italy. Instead, the book describes and, above all, praises just about every concentrate in the production of which the controversial star oenologist Riccardo Cotarella had a hand.

The relations between the ratings are also somewhat out of joint. One of many possible examples: With 86 points, the simple Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio by de Angelis and the Valpolicella by Zenato are rated just as highly as, for example, the Rosso del Conte and the Cabernet Sauvignon by Tasca d'Almerita or a Barbaresco Gaiun by Marchesi di Gresy.

California - after the goldrush

The California chapter demonstrates how fast-moving the wine world has become. It is like looking back into another world. The vintages between 1997 and 1999 are described in detail, the years in which the dot.com hype reached its peak and Silicon Valley spat out 64 new millionaires every morning. Buying up half the harvest of a boutique wine for the next party was good manners. European importers, on the other hand, got cut allocations by fax and no more personal appointments. Today, after the collapse of this first generation of the new economy and after September 11, all that is water under the bridge. So this chapter reads like a fairy tale from a bygone era: "Robby in a wine wonderland".

A bit of statistics in between: Parker rates 1,706 wines from 193 Californian producers. Of these, 1060 wines receive 90 or more points from him. That is about 62 percent. 34 wines even get a place in the wine Olympus with 98 - 100 points.

The comparison to Bordeaux, where the vintages 1995 to 2000 are concerned, among which, according to Parker's own judgement, there is a real vintage of the century ("2000 - The best Bordeaux of all times), is revealing: the master found 1,396 wines from 360 producers worthy of inclusion in his guide. 393 wines (approx. 28%) were worth 90 and more points and in 14 cases he drew the card 98 to 100.

Can this be? In Parker's view, do the Bordelais winemaking elite produce less outstanding wines than their Californian colleagues, even in peak years? Yet he himself says that Bordeaux is the measure of all things for him when it comes to high-quality wines (see above). Does the man not read his own notes? At any rate, he does not seem to have analysed them statistically.

Incidentally, the question naturally arises: Who is interested in all the over-excited miracle wines he has found in California? All those Majas, Screaming Eagles, Araujos, Kistlers, Turleys, Harlans, etc.? Most of them are not available in Europe. The Parker ratings hardly verifiable. It has not been possible in recent years to create a really sustained interest in these wines in Europe and to establish a market for them. Occasionally, they were presented like mythical creatures at rarity tastings, weighed and, with a few exceptions, found to be too light compared to other cult wines from France, Australia or Spain. Some well-known importers like Martin Kössler have largely withdrawn from this business in view of the horrendous prices. In the meantime, some of the boutique producers have drastically lowered their prices, and a premium winery like Mondavi, which has been spoilt for success, is in the red. It is not the first and certainly not the last goldrush to leave its mark on California.


Parker's Wine Guide
8000 wines from the most important wine regions of the world
tested and rated. Advice for wine buying.
Author: Robert M. Parker jr. in collaboration with Pierre-Antoine Rovani
Collection Rolf Heyne, Munich, ISBN 3-89910-201-0
Price: 85 euros (D), 87.40 euros (A), 136 sFr (CH)

Source: www.best-of-wine.com


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