2018 M & C Lapierre, Morgon “Cuvee Marcel Lapierre” Cru Beaujolais, France.
The beautiful 2018 Lapierre Cuvee Marcel, one of the wold’s great wines, is full of generosity and natural soulfulness with loads of pure Gamay fruit, deep floral tones, spices and mineral notes, making for a stunning effort and one we’ve been accustomed to over the years. It is a perfect tribute to the late Marcel Lapierre, crafted by his son Mathieu, who has really done a fantastic job since taking over this famous Morgon estate, which was originally founded in 1904, known for their expressive and natural style wines, which are all certified organic and inspired by, as Lapierre’s importer Kermit Lynch notes, Jules Chauvet, a man whom many now call his spiritual godfather. Chauvet was a winemaker, a researcher, a chemist, and a viticultural prophet that convinced Marcel Lapierre that Beaujolais should follow natural winemaking, fighting against the use of chemicals and pesticides, and restoring historic traditions, his influence is still felt today in the great wines of this region, like top producers Dutraive, Foillard, Thevenet, Sunier, Guy Breton and of course the young Matthieu Lapierre. This 2018 is everything you’d ever want and expect with ripe layers of black plum, Luxardo maraschino cherries, pomegranate, red currant and candied orange peel fruits along with a hint of earth, lovely crushed violets, walnut, cinnamon, all spice, a faint touch of game, minty herb and a delicate sense of minerallity.
The 2018 Cuvee Marcel Lapierre, which comes from a special selection of 100 year old wines in the Morgon Cru set on gravelly soils underpinned by the classic decomposed granite shows a textural brilliance and has a hedonistic mouth feel, this wine just makes you happy, it asks or wants for nothing, giving true vinous pleasure. The grapes are all carefully hand tended, with the Lapirerre’s choosing to pick a bit later and with full grape development and minimalist approach in the cellar using indigenous yeast fermentations. The Lapierres, being Matthieu and his sister Camille, raise their wines on fine lees for at least nine months in neutral oak foudres and fûts ranging from three to thirteen years old as not to accent the wood on the wines, preferring each wine to as transparent and fruit expressive as possible. The Cuvee Marcel, saw full whole cluster fermentation, in the à l’ancienne method, with primary maceration at low temperatures and lasting for two to three weeks usually. All of wines at Lapierre are delicious, especially this old vine Gamay, which is pretty hard to get these, but I also highly recommend their estate Morgon as well as their Juliénas, which is done with their cousin Christophe Pacalet, plus the other special bottling Morgon “Cuvée Camille” that is the most recent addition to the winery’s lineup. The gracious and dark ruby hued Cuvee Marcel gains complexity as you happily sip it and while easy and joyous it reminds you often that it is also a seriously impressive wine, in particular this vintage.
($50 Est.) 95 Points, grapelive