Aldo Viola
Alcamo - Sicily
In north-western Sicily, Aldo Viola single-handedly cultivates a total of 9 hectares of vineyards, which are spread over many small plots in various villages, some of which are quite far apart. The largest of these is located in Feudo Guarini, a full 30 kilometres from the winery, where he planted Syrah and Nero d'Avola a few years ago in a previously largely fallow area at an altitude of 350 metres.
Enthusiastic, passionate, extroverted: Aldo Viola is one of the more charismatic figures on the Italian winegrowing scene. When you see and hear him at tastings, it's hard to imagine him alone among the vines in Alcamo, Sicily, where his family has owned vineyards for four generations. In fact, Aldo travelled around the world for several years, learning to dance the tango, several languages and many different styles of wine, before finally settling in the north-west of the island in 2000 - an area that is hardly known in our part of the world, but according to Aldo, one of the cradles of Italian viticulture and today the corner of Europe with the highest density of vineyards.
ALDO VIOLA IN RED
He single-handedly cultivates a total of 9 hectares of vines, which are spread over many small plots in various villages around Alcamo, some of which are quite far apart. The largest of these is located in Feudo Guarini, a full 30 kilometres from the winery, where he planted Syrah and Nero d'Avola a few years ago in a previously largely fallow area at an altitude of 350 metres. While the latter variety was obvious, the idea of planting Syrah was due to his passion for it, his partly French roots and the conviction that it would grow and thrive in this environment (limestone-clay soils, sometimes north-facing exposures, warm and dry climate, lots of wind). He was proved right, as his two single-varietal interpretations, the Coccinella and above all the Guarini Plus, bear impressive witness.
ALDO VIOLA IN WHITE
Even though there is a third red wine, Moretto, based on Perricone, Syrah and Nerello Mascalese, Aldo's vineyards are actually located in a territory with predominantly white varieties: in the far west, around Trapani and Marsala, Grillo plays first fiddle and Aldo Viola also dedicates a rather spectacular interpretation to the variety with Egesta. However, the absolute number one in the north-west and with a good 30,000 hectares in the whole of Sicily is Catarratto. He tries to elicit the flavours of times gone by in the ever exciting Krimiso. To achieve this, he now officially cultivates his vineyards organically and also uses various biodynamic methods. Two spraying rounds a year are usually enough for his vines. Copper is only used in exceptional years, so he only has to treat his vines with a little sulphur. Due to the dry weather conditions, this is admittedly easier than in most other wine-growing regions in Italy, but not everyone does it.
In the cellar, Aldo Viola uses the wild yeast populations of his vineyards, partly because he - like us - is firmly convinced that they are an elementary component of his terroir and therefore also manifest themselves in his wines. For his white wines, he relies on long maceration times, which he knows how to control so subtly that they are barely noticeable, while for the red wines, the contact with the skins is relatively short and entirely geared towards emphasising their elegant characteristics. The majority of the wines are matured in steel tanks; he only sometimes uses wood for his red wines. Aldo does not add or remove anything, does not fining or filtering and, if he deems it appropriate, does not use sulphur.
