I was born in 1958 and have had more than a few great Barolos from that year. To me this vintage shows the best that Barolo can become. The only ultra high end Barolo I haven’t tasted is Monfortino from 1958. Oddero even produced a wine that will make you weak at the knees in 1958. The apogee to me.
1961 Oddero is pretty epic as well.
Am I the only one who had to look up what “apogee” means?
I was born in the rather shitty year 1957, but from that poor vintage we have had a few brilliant wines from Gattinara and Barolo
I would prefer 1964 as the
vintage (that) shows the best that Barolo can become
It is maybe an atypical vintage, but back in these days many were
I think you got some atypical wines in your tasting, even “lower” Nebbiolo bottlings from the 60s and 70s Ive gotten my hands on have been firing on all cylinders in the last couple years. but the year really makes a big difference. My anniversary nebbiolos (2015) I am planning on holding for 20+ year celebrations though.
No
Apogee is a complex issue …
I was born in 57 as well Claus, and a 1957 Marchesi di Barolo Barolo was the only ‘Birth year wine’ I’ve found worth trying, and it was wonderful. It stole the show against a line up of good 2nd growth Bordeaux and younger Barolo. It was the only time I ventured to try a wine from that vintage but it worked out gloriously on my 57th Birthday. Would love to try the 57 or 58 Oddero.
I collect and drink a lot of barolo. Some observations based on my personal tastes:
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My generic sweet spot is 15-25 years from vintage. I wind up in the high end of the range if the producer is more traditional or the vintage is more classic.
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Increasingly I find wines even from more traditional producers are accessible at the 10 year mark (e.g. 2008 for G. Rinaldi, G. Mascarello, Cappellano). But that just means they are no longer “shut down” at this point, not that they’ve got lots of tertiary characteristics. So I’d still rather wait for year 20 wherever possible.
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I do find you can often overshoot if you’re holding out for 30, 40, 50 years. I’ve had 67’s, 78’s, 82’s, etc and my personal experience is none of them were dead but many times they’ve lost more than they’ve gained. At least half the time I feel like I’ve lost some acidity and gotten some marzipan-like sweetness that detracts from what I like in barolo. Sometimes it’s all working at age 35 an it’s still fresh but complex, tertiary, etc and those are amazing but rare. Especially if you’re buying on the secondary market to try these very expensive rare vintages I don’t know that it is good risk/reward.
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I also tend to agree with what I once heard at Vajra which was that it was fun to open 30 year old Vajra bottles for novelty purposes but they believed the vineyard and vintage differences started to get smoothed over at that sort of age. I.e. the wines were all pretty good but tasted more and more like each other vs their terroir. I think that’s been consistent with my experience too.
FWIW
I’m generally in agreement with your takes. This one gave me a bit of pause was this one, as 30 years is now the '89 vintage, and it seems to me that wines from even early in the 80s are well short of that generic old stage.
Ross, Claus,
I´m also 1957 - and while it is definitely not a great vintage there are some good wines to have … also in Piemont, but I prefer by far the Rhone valley and Burgundy. I´ve had some very enjoyable Hermitage (Sizeranne) and CdP - and also outstanding Burgundies like Bonnes-Mares (Vogüe), RC + LT (DRC) … down to NSG LSG and even Chassagne-M. Clos St.Jean rouge.
No really great Bordeaux, but Lafite, Latour, Haut-Brion, Las Cases … were very good, Mouton ok , and even Poujeaux was very good.
(the list is by far incomplete …)
Gerhard,
Good to hear, thanks. ‘Birth year wines’ have never been a big deal for me, even before I discovered what a weak vintage it was, except for babies, ha. Nice to know there’s the odd one out there that can make for a tasty treat. When my birthday rolls around, I’m happy to enjoy a bunch of good non-birth-year wines with good friends.
A humble 1957 Nervi Gattinara on my Bday was fantastic. Better than the 1970.
Cedric Bouchard, Vouette et Sorbee, Prüm, Egon Müller, Musar, Figeac, Giacosa, Bartolo Mascarello, Pereira d'Oliveira - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers a Borgogno Barolo last year had a lot of quality and finesse.
Would love to try a Bordeaux, Bourgogne or Northern Rhone at some time. Thanks for the info Gerhard
Nowadays I also won´t search especially for any 1957 - I´ve had my fair share … and almost all 1959s and most 1953/55s are better -
of course always depending on bottle condition.
However … usually 1957s are available for less money than 53/55/59, not to speak of 61 (although in Burgundy I´d prefer 62+64) … and if a bottle of 1957 looks good - why not.
Recently I had a CdP 57 negociant bottling (I´d have to look which one) that was really excellent …
I love these wines when older too. But it is pretty hard to find well stored bottles and I have just about quit trying. The fail rate is just too high.
It’s certainly producer and vintage dependent. I love 1989’s but even there I’d throw out Produttori Torre, Sandrone and Cavallotto Vignolo as three I’ve tried where I’d say “drink up.” 1989 Gaja Barbaresco and 1989 Cappellano have both been delicious & fresh but I don’t know that I’d say there’s additional upside but more a 10 year plateau. The 1989 Conterno Cascina Francia is maybe the only one I’ve had where I thought there was some more upside but that’s basically a Monfortino in disguise.
I’m not big on all this barolo necro-porn. It’s totally unhelpful for 99% of the wine lovers who want to get more into barolo because they can’t source this stuff anyhow. The producers from the 50’s and 60’s are mostly a crapshoot; names like Scarpa, Fontanafredda, etc. 2/3 of today’s popular names weren’t around back then. Of the other 1/3 of the producers that are still around today, most often the wines they were making in the 60’s and 70’s were from fruit from different vineyards, different winemakers and different cantinas than what they use today. So I don’t know how anyone is figuring out what they want to jump for vs not when you’re staring at that lone dusty Cappellano Troglia bottle from 1973. And that’s before you get to provenance.
Charles, I wonder if you’ve had good bottles of 1989 PdB? A recent Pora was still quite youthful:
There was a lesser bottle of Rabaja, but I’m sure that was just a bad bottle.
For 1957, I’ve had good bottles of Cappellano Barolo and Barbaresco, but those have gotten quite expensive now. 
I had excellent luck with a 1989 Ovello. Really, really, impressive, one of the best barbarescos I think I’ve ever tried. But I’ve been through ~5 bottles of the torre including a magnum and while they are still nice, they collapse after ~2 hours after opened.
I had great luck once with a 1967 Gaja, that’s my oldest and then tried more from the early 70’s. But… I would say it was not better or more complex than something like a 2001 Giacosa red label. Quite the opposite! And for every cool 1967 Gaja story I have 3 mediocre 1970 Cappellano stories.