RIP Auguste Clape

Sad news from the Rhone valley

Sad. The Clape Cornas back in the 1990s was an epiphany wine for me, easily 1/3 of my “cellar” is now Northern Rhone syrah. He helped define Cornas. Brooding, powerful, gamey wines of distinction. Have not had any Cornas bottlings since a 2010 Renaissance - they need more sleep - but buy and drink the CDRs and Vin de Amis with regularity. The VDA is a perennial buy for me by the case.

Sad, indeed. He was the last of his generation since Noel Verset died three years ago.

Here’s a photo I took of him in his cellar in 1988.

(This was shot by natural light – a ~60W lightbulb – on Tri-X with a Leica M4 and a 35mm f/2 Summicron. I’m sure I shot wide open.)

Love old b & w photos

Such a depth of image

Marcel Juge still hanging on.

Fu is hustlin Juge to make one more, just
One more vintage. 2016 Fuge.

Ah, right. But when I was cutting my teeth on Northern Rhone in the 80s, Juge always took a back seat to Clape and Verset. Sorry, Charlie.

Charlie says Clape has no fruit.

Just because your decades of living in humidity have made you unable to taste flavor doesn’t mean you should misquote me

The humid tropics are all about fruit, baby! Where do you think the exotic stuff comes from! I Need to move to a cooler climate.

Always loved John Livingstone-Learmoth’s line that if Auguste Clape were to have a monument, it should be a stone, not a statue. Seems apposite today.

The Clape line up is impressive work from top to bottom.

Yup.
and lovely photo John

John Livingstone-Learmonth has a nice tribute to Clape on Twitter with a photo:

@DrinkRhone
Tweet 146 13 July 1925-15 July 2018 Auguste Clape, Child of Nature, my Professor and Hero. May you taste the very best Syrah above the hills of the Ardèche, mon très cher ami #clape #cornas

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Sad to hear this. Glad I was lucky enough to have met him two years ago. And lucky for us all that the domaine continues on in good hands.

RIP, Sir. (looking for the emoji where sad me is raising a glass in tribute, but this is what I found…)

FYI, Eric Asimov has a poignant ode to Clape on the obits page of the NY Times today.

No real words. Great wines of place and person.

I remember first buying the 1981 Clape cornas at MacArthers In DC back in the early 80s for I think $6.99 ea., and remember trying a glass and thinking “very tasty”. RIP