To fully understand the intense bond that holds Martin Gojer, and his wife Marion Untersulzner, at Maso Pranzegg it is worth taking a few steps back and clarify what a Maso is: a clearing, with a peasant house and barn, with attached the surrounding plots of land, intended for animal husbandry, agriculture or viticulture. So far there seems to be nothing strange since a farm consists more or less in the same housing/ productive solution.
The difference lies in the fact that, since 1526, according to the legal system of the Land of Tyrol, a Maso does not include the “real” subdivision, or rather, cannot be divided between several heirs, and therefore, since then, exists only in its “closed” form, which obliges the owner to give it in inheritance or to sell it in its entirety. This formula works so well that, out of 19.000 Tyrolean Masi, 11.000 have been handed down “closed” until today.
Returning to the Maso Pranzegg, it is a property that has ancient origins (the cellar is from the thirteenth century), purchased by Martin’s grandmother around the mid-1930s and immediately set according to the principle of polyculture, which consisted in cultivating as many products as possible, in order to achieve food self-sufficiency. From his grandmother, the Maso passed into the hands of Martin’s father, and, once the latter passed away, into the hands of Martin himself, in 1997, at just eighteen years of age.
At the time the maso cultivated grapes, cherries, walnuts and chestnuts and processed products and animals from the woods, and it took only three years, to Martin, to understand that it was necessary to convert all production passing exclusively to viticulture. This is how, since 2000, they began to sell the grapes produced to large buyers, increasingly delighted by their quality. With the passing of time Martin realized he had a treasure in his hands and, in 2010, he made the firm decision to stop the grapes trade, making his own wines with his own labels.
The wines were good but Martin wanted something more: he wanted his wines to express the truth of his vineyards, freeing the grapes from chemistry and embracing the organic (first) and biodynamic (then). In addition to biodynamic preparations, homeopathic herbal teas and absolute sincerity in the cellar, Martin’s next challenge is to reintroduce animals into the vineyard, to close the circle and return to the polyculture abandoned years before. For now there are bees and hens but the next step is the introduction of dwarf sheep, the only ones able to graze without, because of the height, succeeding to get to the grape shoots of the pergola trentina.
Among Pranzegg’s wines it is useless to say that the most emblematic is the Schiava Campill, a “freed” Schiava (Schiava means Slave), as Martin likes to call it, a Schiava to whom has been ecologically restored the freedom to express its truth. This label was born in a vineyard of less than one hectare, on a steep slope, planted with 4000 vines over 50 years of age, whose yield slightly exceeds the kilogram per plant. Once the grapes arrive in the cellar, after a partial destemming, spontaneous fermentation in truncated cone vats and large oak barrels, in contact with skins and stems for 5 weeks (3 of which submerged hat), the wine is left to age, for one year, in the same containers, for 10 months in cement tanks, and for 9 in bottles, before marketing.
The 2019 vintage shows an almost impalpable ruby color, with a delicately orange nail, and a range of scents that instantly erases the preconceived idea that, usually, you have of Schiava, with notes of blackberry, cherry, pomegranate, bitter orange, followed by wilted rose petal, mountain pine and undergrowth, with final echoes of vinyl and incense. If the smell is intriguing, it is in the mouth that this wine gives the best of itself, erasing, for the second time, the preconceived idea of a Schiava, thanks to an acidity that makes the eyes sparkle, a sapidity almost bitter and highest level tannins; all combined with the return of red fruit, undergrowth and vinyl, which accompany the sip to suych a juicy closure so long to overturn, for the third time, the stereotypical concept of Schiava that over time a drinker may have made. Needless to say: a wine to try at any cost!
RATING: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
PRICE (€-€€€€€): €€
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