Assembled from separately-vinified (vendange entier) 40 and a 60 year old sections of vines below Vergelesses and opposite En Charlemagne, Rossignol's 2006 Pernand-Vergelesses Les Fichots is strikingly polished, creamy, and mouth-filling, although with firm, fine underlying tannins. Its vibrant, energetic interchange of ripe, palate-staining dark berries with myriad mineral elements, dark-roasted coffee, vanilla, peat, and roasted meats is utterly striking, protracted, and worthy of a top-notch Corton. I'm betting this will be worth following for a decade or more. "Excellent ripeness came late, but then very quickly," reports Nicolas Rossignol, who began harvested his 2006s already in mid September. "Volnay tends to be precocious, anyway," he adds, "and you have to consider the intensive way in which I've been working the vines lately, with very low yields and intensive canopy management. I wanted to preserve freshness and equilibrium." Rossignol reported that his intention had been to bottle his 2006s correspondingly early to preserve their fruit and refinement, but the mid-winter of 2007-2008 was so bitterly cold that they seized-up, and in the end he permitted them what, for him, is a normal 18 months' elevage. Deeming his fruit - which largely weighed in between 12 and just over 13% potential alcohol - to be healthy, he employed whole clusters and stems selectively, depending on how he thought the technique fit the particular appellation. Once again, I was unable to taste more than half of the roughly two dozen Rossignol's wines - traversing five communes - and he declined to show me this year's Fremiets or Taillepieds on the grounds of their respective three- and two-barrel total production. (That said, Rossignol very generously introduced me by means of a sample to the wines of his neighbor Jean-Marc Boulet - see under that name for my notes.) For further details on Rossignol and his approach to Pinot, see my report in issue 171. Importers: Martine's Wines. Novato, CA; tel. (415) 883-0400; also a Becky Wasserman Selection, Le Serbet (various importers); fax 011-333-80-24-29-70

Black currant and blackberry aromas and flavors pick up a stony note as this holds focus across the palate. Fresh, with finely grained tannins and fine length. Best from 2010 through 2016. 375 cases made. -BS