A blend of 60% Sangiovese, 15% Sagrantino and 25% Montepulciano, the Paolo Bea 2017 Montefalco Rosso Riserva Pipparello is full-bodied but elegant, with natural ripeness and black fruit flavors that are characteristic of this hot and dry vintage. There are lingering hints of sweetness as well in this wine that sees 42 days of skin contact during fermentation and a prolonged 22 months in large oak casks. Bea's hands-off winemaking style means that his releases are always marked by the character of the vintage. He describes this wine as "ruffiano," which in Italian somewhat translates as "ready-to-please."

The 2010 Montefalco Rosso Riserva Pipparello is a blend of 60% Sangiovese, 15% Sagrantino and 25% other red grapes from the vineyards. The bouquet reveals immediate and compelling spiciness, with dried blackberry and black fruit backed by smoke, tar, cardamom and Teriyaki barbecue sauce. The wine is black, austere and savory at its core. There is virtually no fruity sweetness, nor will you find much in the way of primary intensity. Instead, you get bold personality with smoky flavors of scorched earth and charred spice. The finish is powerful and firm.

The 2006 Montefalco Rosso Riserva Pipparello bursts from the glass with super-ripe dark cherries, tobacco, licorice, spices and flowers. This is a bold, racy Pipparrello made in an opulent, almost extravagant style for this house buffered by firm yet attractive tannins. The aromas and flavors built towards a rustic, meaty finish. Nevertheless, there is plenty to admire and certainly much to talk about in this eccentric Umbrian red. The Pipparello is 60% Sangiovese, 25% Montepulciano and 15% Sagrantino. Anticipated maturity: 2011-2021. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchants, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990

The 2005 Montefalco Rosso Riserva Pipparello is a rock star wine. This powerful, intense red emerges with generous dark cherries, plums, licorice, smoke and leather. The late harvest in 2005 resulted in an extraordinarily complete wine blessed with tons of pedigree. The 2005 Pipparello is 60% Sangiovese, 25% Montepulciano d’Abruzzo and 15% Sagrantino. The wine saw 42 days of contact on the skins and was aged for a year in stainless steel followed by two years in cask. Simply put, it is magnificent! Anticipated maturity: 2013-2025. Giampiero Bea is one of Umbria’s leading producers. The wines are made in a totally natural, non-interventionalist style, with no temperature control in fermentation, only natural yeasts and no added sulfites. At their best, these are wonderfully pure, expressive wines loaded with character. Because Bea lets nature runs its course, the wines are highly vintage sensitive. In great years the wines are typically fabulous but in weaker vintages the wines tend to reflect both the positive and negative attributes of those years to a higher degree than most wines these days. Whether that is a good or bad thing depends on one’s point of view, but there is no mistaking that when Bea has ideal conditions to work with his wines are stellar. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchants, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990

The 2004 Montefalco Rosso Riserva Pipparello offers greater density, richness and polish than the San Vincenzo, with sweet notes of candied cherries and flowers that waft out of its mid-weight, ethereal frame. Two years in oak gives this wine nuances that are slightly more forward than the San Vincenzo, and it, too, is probably best enjoyed over the next few years. Here the vineyard is approximately 22 years old. The blend is 60% Sangiovese, 25% Montepulciano, and 15% Sagrantino. The wine was macerated on the skins for 45 days and spent about two years in large, neutral casks. Anticipated maturity. 2009-2014. (Not yet released) My visit with Giampiero Bea was illuminating, as we spent several hours tasting through virtually every wine in the cellar. Bea has a number of promising wines in cask that should satisfy the cravings of his most passionate fans. Among the wines that will be released in coming years is a new Sagrantino from the Rignano vineyard which is a stone’s throw from the winery. The new cellar, still under construction, is decidedly stark and minimalist in style. Bea pursues a natural, non-interventionalist approach. The wines undergo fermentation without temperature control, using only ambient yeasts. Malolactic fermentation takes place in steel, though here, too, the timing and pace is dictated by nature. The wines are neither fined nor filtered prior to being bottled, and all important operations are undertaken according to the lunar calendar. To be sure, this is high-risk winemaking. The results can be striking, but they can also be quite variable when nature decides to be capricious. Bea prefers hot vintages such as 2003 and 2007, so it is no surprise he is most excited about those vintages. While those wines certainly possess impressive concentration, my sense is he might be able to do more in less favorable years like 2004 and 2005, where some of the wines lack a touch of depth. Bea’s labels contain a wealth of information about the vintage and how each wine was made, although the notes are only printed in Italian. Longtime fans of the wines will notice that in recent years the specific names of the vineyards have taken greater prominence in the labels. The Bea wines are all about subtlety, grace and elegance. At their best, they are among the finest wines to emerge from Montefalco, and Italy, for that matter. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchants, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800)?910-1990