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On the first day of his professional career, Severino Garofano, the winemaker who has done more than anyone to put Puglia, and to some extent neighbouring Calabria (respectively, the heel and toe of Italy's boot) on the map of serious wine-producing zones of the world, found himself in the middle of a war.
It was 1957, early September, vintage time. He had just arrived from Avellino in Campania where, scion of a long line of vine-growers he had been bon and raised, and had just graduated from the local School of Oenology (one of ltaly's oldest and the south’s most important). He was to start work that day with the firm of Francesco Candido, in Sandonaci, on the Salentino peninsula of Puglia, Candido having sought him out in Avellino because he needed help on his 450-hectare wine estate.
But when the young Severino arrived on the train at San Pietro, near the baroque city of Lecce, he found the boss wasn't waiting for him as he'd expected. There was a strike on and the Puglian growers, who still worked under the mezzadria system, whereby the fruits of their labours were shared with the landowner, were in dispute with the bosses and the industriali of Northern Italy who were buying their wines for such a pittance they couldn't support their families.,
The strikers had cut off the whole of the southern part of the peninsula. Severino had to walk the 25 kilometers to his new residence, across picket lines and through violent scuffles. That afternoon three men from Sandonaci were shot dead by the carabinieri. Today Garofano comments in his dry, humorous style: 'I entered the world of wine in this climate of war, and for 40 years I have continued to wage war.'
He had come to Candido on the understanding that the estate would do ‘something new'. In those days, when Puglia produced almost nothing but full-coloured, alcoholic, but rough and soulless wine (vin de clochard, he calls it, because since the 1960s the main market has been France, although Northern Italy has remained an important customer and Germany is coming on big), ‘something new' was the concept of making wine for sale in bottle. The only wine deemed to be worthy of bottling by Francesco Candido, father of the present proprietor Alessandro (though Francesco, now in his nineties, is still alive) was rosato made from the local Negroamaro - something which only one producer, Leone de Castris, was doing at the time.
It was a challenge for a young oenologist, and Severino Garofano is one of those men who thrive on challenge. After five years of living with the Candido family, however restricted by his contract from consulting for others, and by the boss from trying anything else new - he accepted an offer from the Cantina Sociale di Copertino to take over as director. His conditions were that the cantina undertake a serious bottling programme, and that he be free to consult for other producers.
So began the era of developing Puglian red wine, based on Negroamaro, as a premium product for sale in bottle. What were the problems? ’At 360° there were problems’, he jokes, seriously. Fundamentally, Puglia needed to be brought out of a dark-ages mentality in which no-one believed in the possibility of producing fine wine, not even the producers. There was no culture to fall back on, no expertise to consult. It was working in the dark towards an objective understood only in the broadest outline. The research laboratory at Lecce helped greatly. It was possible, by showing people analytical data, to demonstrate what was wrong with the previous style and how it could be corrected with lower yields, different picking strategies, and temperature-controlled vinification. More than just oenologist, Severino found himself working as a psychologist.
If there has been success,' he says, 'it has been in getting the various sectors to communicate with one another'. And, one might add, in getting the producers to co-operate with one another, to exchange experience and information but, mostly, to encourage the belief that Puglia could make quality wine which the market would not only accept but, given reasonable prices, would welcome.
The portfolio of producers that Garofano looks after today seems to have built itself up organically. In most cases it was the producers who came looking for Garofano rather than the other way round. First it was Barone Bacile, also of Copertino. By 1965 it was bottling its product and was, he says, the most serious producer on the market until the business was sold in 1993. Then Cosimo Taurino, today perhaps the most internationally prestigious of the team, came on board, and it began developing what would become the world-renowned Patriglione and Notarpanaro reds. At around the same time, the firm of Caparra & Siciliani from Cirò in Calabria, sought him out. Also, he began working with the firm of Librandi, on the difficult Gaglioppo grape, from which Librandi's outstanding Duca San Felice (wholly) and Gravello (in part) are derived. In early 1995 Librandi took over what was left of Barone Bacile, and Garofano and the Librandis are today creating a winery which will be of major importance in years to come.
In 1977 Candido, now in Alessandro’s hands, came back into the fold, and wines like Cappello di Prete and Duca d’Aragona were developed. Severino is not willing to be drawn on which his favourites are, wine-wise or producer-wise, but it is observable that he derives great creative satisfaction from working with this firm, which is willing to experiment not just with the local varieties, Negroamaro and Malvasia Nera, but also with grapes from farther afield such as Montepulciano, Cabernet, Merlot, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Sauvignon.
In the 1980s the team was expanded with the entry of the firm of Vallone, like Taurino, producers of Brindisi DOC rosso and rosato. And in the 1990s, Severino took on his first white wine specialists, Botromagno of Gravina in northern Puglia. In his office at the Cantina Sociale di Copertino, the phone rings constantly with people wanting advice. Coolly he puts all the nerve-jangled producers at their ease, even if he does betray the occasional annoyance.
Severino has always felt it necessary to travel. The most pressing need in the early days, was to build a market, since if he was going to convince producers to make premium wine, he had to convince them also that they would be able to sell it. So he packed his bags and went off to countries down buyers. But Severino has always retained an open mind, a desire to improve, based on the conviction that 'quality' is a like Sweden and the United States to hunt concept that 'we are forever seeking, but never quite achieve, though we may get near'.
In his quest for new ideas to improve his work at home he has, he says, been to every major wine-producing area in the world except South America, as well as doing a stage at Beaune, another in Bordeaux and one in Champagne. This does not mean that he has embraced international grape varieties at the expense of the home-grown originals – although the prototype wine styles derived from those varieties are very much of his devising. He seems to have in view two types of wine: the traditional, which 'needs to defend its identity' without 'correction'; and those made with this evolving sense of quality in mind to please the consumer who, for him is the ultimate judge of 'quality'.
Asked to define his philosophy, he answers: 'Having the heart linked to tradition, ma non troppo [but not too much]. Remembering that the part of reason - observation, research, renewal - is of equal importance. In the context of renewal, Severino is happy to experiment with unconventional blends, or international varieties, though they should not, outside of their home context, be used
varietally so much as elements in the overall complex of a wine. A wine of 'quality', he says, requires some 'enigma' in the taste, something which makes the taster wonder if there is not something more to this experience, something one does not quite understand, but would like to. It is the same impulse, he says, as that which drives man to dig ever deeper into culture.
Severino Garofano is a modest man, ma non troppo. I pressed him on what he thought would have become of Puglian wine had he not come on the scene. "Considering the success of the producers I have followed,' he replied, 'without excessive modesty, it is clear that we have made a notable contribution. But I don't claim for myself any great credit, because in the totality of what is quality, man's role is very small.’
There is a long way to go in southern Italy before the battle for 'quality' as the prime requirement of production is won. The statistics are all discouraging - still only two per cent of the vast production of Puglia qualifying for DOC, only about 10 per cent in bottle. Yet the qualitative difference between two per cent and 100 per cent seems somehow infinitely less than that separating two per cent and 0 per cent. The credit for giving the south credibility, for giving southerners pride in their grapes and wines, for creating a launch-pad for the future, is undoubtedly largely due to Severino Garofano and his unrelenting war.
severino's war
Nicolas Belfrage, MW - Decanter, January 1996, vol.21 n.5, pagg. 26-28
IN THE BATTLE FOR QUALITY, PUGLIA, AT THE HEEL OF ITALY'S BOOT, SEEMS TO BE ON THE LOSING SIDE. BUT IF IT HAD NOT BEEN FOR ONE MAN, THE INDOMITABLE SEVERINO GAROFANO, IT MIGHT NEVER EVEN HAVE BEEN ABLE TO MUSTER AN ARMY, SAYS NICOLAS BELFRAGE
I contenuti del Centro Studi sono curati da Stefano e Renata Garofano
2023 - 2025 © Centro Studi Severino Garofano - Privacy Policy - centrostudi@severinogarofano.it