Decibel Testify Pinot Noir 2019

A delicate beauty of our best efforts from a graceful vintage in Martinborough. This is that special occasion wine; pair it with a confit duck or tuck away for the next 7 years, your patience will be rewarded.

Martinborough sits in a perfect Pinot Noir pocket on the lower North Island. To the west of Martinborough is the Rimutaka Mountain Ranges, protecting the region from the westerly rains. To the southeast lies the Aorangi Range and due east are the foothills leading up the coast of the North Island. There is, however, some exposure to the cold southerlies coming up through Palliser Bay in the spring that limit flowering and result in low yielding vines producing fruit of high intensity.

This single vineyard wine was produced from a dry-farmed block with a unique soil structure for Martinborough with clay over top of free draining old riverbeds. Slightly more elevated than the typical river terrace soils than most of Martinborough, this vineyard has great exposure with a northeast aspect. The vines are planted in mostly Dijon clones of 667, 777, 114 and 115, with a few rows of UCD Clone 5, half of which are planted on their own rootstock.

After a relatively warm summer, there was a bit of rain ahead of and during harvest. However, the dry farmed site remained relatively unaffected by the rain as the temperatures also remained warm throughout picking.

Picking was done by clone across the vineyard and over the course of 3 weeks. All the fruit was hand sorted and a variety of vinifcation vats were filled, ranging from 5 to 40% whole bunch ferments where they cold soaked for a few days before naturally warming. Some ferments went ‘wild’ with indigenous yeasts and some were inoculated with some organic yeast strains. After fermentation the wine was macerated on skins for an additional 10 to 21 days. They were then pressed in a small basket press, settled in tank and then put to French barriques, again separated by clone.

The Testify Pinot Noir was a barrel selection resulting in 25% new oak. Clones 777 and 667 were the focus of this wine, creating a more aromatic and elegant style. Some Clone 5 was used to add more mid palate weight. The wine was unfined and bottled in early March of 2019 and remained in bottle until its release in August 2020.

In most ‘reserve’ wines, producers tend to make more extracted, riper or more oaked wines with the idea it delivers more for the price. That’s not my thoughts at all (particularly for Pinot Noir) and why I decided to call this range ‘Testify’. It’s my hand on heart best effort from each vintage. And for Pinot Noir I wanted to create a more elegant and pure wine, which not necessarily a ‘bigger’ wine. This is more precise, selective and really the best Pinot Noir I can produce at the time I made it.