The 1996 Champagnes Revisited

1996 remains one of the great modern-day vintages for Champagne. The wines possess a combination of bright acidity and high sugars that is extremely rare. The best 1996 Champagnes are bold, racy and exuberant, in both absolute and relative terms, something that has also come across in numerous recent tastings, including verticals of Dom Pérignon, Cristal, Krug and Dom Ruinart. For all of these houses 1996 is one of the more powerful, extroverted vintages of the last 15 or so years.

To be sure, the vintage also has its critics. Those who are skeptical of the vintage claim that some producers harvested too early and that a number of wines possess excessively austere and lean personalities that will never soften. My experience with the Champagnes below and others, however, has mostly been extremely positive and I am convinced the best wines have enough balance of fruit and acidity to age gracefully, in some cases for decades.

Both 1996 Dom Pérignons are gorgeous and have the potential to continue to develop beautifully for many years. The 1996 Dom Pérignon shows all of the classic notes of this wine in an exuberant, big style. Smoke, spices and roasted nuts are some of the nuances that emerge from this classy and very complete Dom Pérignon. The 1996 Dom Pérignon Rosé is brilliant from start to finish, and this bottle is one of the finest I have had. Sweet, expansive and generous, the wine blossoms on the palate with extraordinary grace as layers of silky, perfumed fruit open up in the glass. This is a beautiful Dom Pérignon Rosé. The 1996 Dom Ruinart is particularly large-scaled for this generally subtle wine, an impression that was reinforced when I tasted a large number of vintages a few months ago. This is a bold, weighty Dom Ruinart that continues to change in the glass, revealing new shades of its smoke and mineral-infused fruit with every taste. The 1996 is a particularly good vintage for Dom Ruinart, and also one of the more accessible Champagnes of that year.

The two wines from Krug are simply breathtaking. The 1996 Krug Vintage is explosive on the palate, as layers of aromas and flavors meld together in a stunning display of elegance and power. This pure, sensual beauty is utterly rapturous. The relatively generous style of this wine makes it hard to resist today, but it will age for decades. This is a brilliant wine in every way. Hard as it may seem to believe, the 1996 Krug Clos du Mesnil is even better. Still painfully young, the wine reveals incredible detail in a vivid expression of white peaches, flowers and minerals. While the Vintage is exuberant and expressive, the Clos du Mesnil is all about subtlety, finesse and an incredibly understated, feminine style of Champagne. This is surely one of the most profound wines that have ever passed my lips, and my only hope is that I will have an opportunity to taste it again at some point in the future. For now, the 1996 Clos du Mesnil remains a reference-point wine of the very highest level. This bottle of the 1996 Salon is like every other bottle I have had recently, which is to say tight, tight, tight. Still, this painfully unevolved, mineral-driven wine shows tons of potential in its floral, white fruits. In a recent tasting of the 1979 Champagnes, the Salon was one of the finest wines, but it needed several hours of air to open up. Although the 1996 is pure magic in a glass, it remains a wine for the exceedingly patient.

Philipponnat’s 1996 Clos des Goisses is one of the more approachable wines in this vintage. Made in a slightly oxidative style, it reveals lovely complexity in a richly-textured, expansive personality, with a pretty vein of minerality that frames the long finish. The Clos Saint-Hilaire, Billecart-Salmon’s old-vine, single-vineyard Blanc de Noirs, is another of the more accessible 1996s. Ripe pears, minerals and flowers appear in this generous, textured Champagne. This delicate, sublime wine is drinking beautifully today. Jacques Selosse’s 1996 Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs is exotic and sweet, in a style that combines plenty of ripe fruit with the intensely mineral-driven style of the vintage. This is a beautiful, structured Champagne although it doesn’t seem to match the profound level achieved by the finest wines of the vintage. The 1996 Pol Roger Sir Winston Churchill is an immensely rewarding, complete Champagne that is drinking well today but that also has the potential to continue to improve in bottle. Nothing in particular stands out here, but as is often the case with this cuvee, I am struck by the wine’s awesome balance and supreme harmony. Simply put, this is a strikingly beautiful wine from Pol Roger.

Roederer’s 1996 Cristal is gorgeous. The expressive, floral bouquet melds seamlessly into an expansive palate of sweet fruit. This is an exceptionally polished and finessed Cristal, but like so many vintages, it needs time in bottle, regardless of how rewarding it is today. Even after all of these great 1996s, the Cristal delivers the goods. The 1996 R.D. from Bollinger is another superb wine from this vintage. An expressive bouquet of spices, acacia blossoms and perfumed fruit emerges from the wine’s silky-textured frame. This generous R.D. is drinking well today, but also has enough freshness to age well for years. It is a great version of one of Champagne’s legendary wines.

--  Antonio Galloni