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Girolamo Russo
Sicily, Italy6 wines4.1 avg
411
Giuseppe Russo's family estate on Etna's north slope - named for his late father, built on fifteen hectares of old alberello Nerello at 650-800 metres, run by a former classical pianist.
Making wine on the slopes of Mount Etna is an intensely personal, profound and ongoing act of love.
A friend of mine once said that all people divide into two categories: those who live in Valais and those who want to live there. I have never been there, but I understand this appreciation of the land you live in. And I think the same applies to Etna, at least to some extent. Unlike many producers on the mountain, Giuseppe Russo is affiliated with Etna by the right of birth.
Giuseppe is a graduate in the humanities with a diploma in piano - a classical pianist who also holds a PhD in literature. In 2005, after his father Girolamo died unexpectedly, he came home to re-establish the family estate and dedicated it to his father's memory. He describes his wines in compositional terms. A Rina, he has said, is not a single expression but "a symphony or a melody."
The estate sits in the Passopisciaro area, north slope of Etna, spanning the communes of Castiglione di Sicilia and Randazzo. The Russos work somewhere between fifteen and eighteen hectares of vines today (up from twelve at the start), at altitudes between six hundred and fifty and eight hundred metres, planted on ancient lava flows and surrounded by hazelnut and olive groves. Many vines are alberello (bush-trained), pre-phylloxera, ungrafted, eighty to a hundred years old and older. Yields are very low.
The Russos work several of Etna's contrade - San Lorenzo (with the Piano delle Colombe parcel), Feudo, Feudo di Mezzo, and Calderara Sottana. Grapes are Etna standards: Nerello Mascalese as the backbone, with Nerello Cappuccio alongside; Carricante, Catarratto, Minnella, and a handful of other indigenous whites. Organic farming, everything by hand, native yeasts, large Slavonian botti (around 2,600 litres), some puncheons and a little barrique. Aging twelve to eighteen months before bottling.
The cuvées:
- 'A Rina - the estate Etna Rosso, the daily flagship, drawn from younger vines across the contrade
- San Lorenzo, Feudo, Feudo di Mezzo, Calderara Sottana - single-contrada Etna Rossi
- Nerina - Carricante-led Etna Bianco
- plus a San Lorenzo Bianco and an Etna Rosato in smaller quantities
Girolamo Russo sits among the top Etna estates alongside Passopisciaro, Frank Cornelissen, and Tenuta delle Terre Nere. The house signature is restraint - Nerello made as though it were Nebbiolo on volcanic soil, with the emphasis on transparency rather than muscle.
