International Wine Challenge 2006
Silver Medal
Majella Sparkling Shiraz 2004
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2003
Bronze Medal
Majella Riesling 2005
Majella Shiraz 2003
Majella The Musician 2004
2006 Royal Melbourne Wine Show, Australia
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2004
Rural Finance Trophy for The Best Commercial Red Wine
2006 Royal Brisbane Wine Show, Australia
Majella Cabernet 2004
Thornquest Trophy for the best Red Wine in Commercial Classes
Majella Cabernet 2004
Courier Mail Trophy for the Best Wine in the Show
Majella ‘The Musician’ 2005
Gold Medal
Majella Merlot 2004
Gold Medal
International Wine Challenge 2005
Gold Medal
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2002
Bronze Medal
Majella Sparkling Shiraz 2003
Majella Shiraz 2002
International Wine & Spirits Competition 2005
Silver
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2001
Langton's Classification IV - July 2005
Why Does Langton's Release a Classification?
'An un-official roll call of fine Australian wine…'
What are the Classification categories?
Exceptional: the most highly sought after and prized Australian wines on the market.
Outstanding: Benchmark quality wines with a very strong market following.
Excellent: High performing wines of exquisite quality achieving slightly lower values and market strength.
Distinguished: Secondary market staples or emerging classics. Sometimes undervalued by the market.
The Wines:
Oustanding
Majella The Malleea Cabernet-Shiraz, Coonawarra South Australia
Distinguished
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon, Coonawarra South Australia
Reviews
The Herald Sun, Australia
22nd September 2006
By Paddy Kendler
Majella The Musician Cabernet Shiraz 2005
‘The debut ’04 vintage was widely acclaimed as one of the best-value Coonawarra reds of last year and some stores may still have dwindling stocks. But if anything, the ’05 is an even better wine and the price remains reasonable given the high quality. Unlike so many young Coonawarra reds – especially those dark, brooding creatures dominated by the cabernet which need bottle age to reveal their charms – The Musician is all ‘upbeat and out-there’ with its bold, youthful black berry fruit laced with sweet and spicy oak. Gorgeous stuff.’
Gourmet Traveler Wine
August/September 2006
Wines To Try
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2003
‘Coonawarra and cabernet: a lovely alliteration and a clear demonstration of why terroir is not owned solely by the French.’
Winefront
26th July 2006
By Campbell Mattinson
‘Majella is the Moss Wood of Coonawarra in my books – and the oak integration of this year’s releases is better than ever. Soft, ripe, naturally-balanced fruit, able to be consumed young or with age. No wonder drinkers love them.’
Majella The Musician Coonawarra Cabernet Shiraz 2005 89 Points
‘This is better than last years. It’s softer and riper and even easier to drink, with grainy, cabernet-sourced (60%) blackcurrant slipped with syrupy, plumy, cherried shiraz. It’s beautifully fresh and deliciously vibrant, and the price-value equation is perfect. Drink: 2006-2009.’
Majella Coonawarra Shiraz 2004 92 Points
‘Deadset delicious. Round and soft and hugely gluggable, its silken texture a joy to experience. Integrated creamy oak on bright, cherry-plummed fruit, complimented by the finest, most filigreed tannins imaginable. Hints of violets and toast. Beautifully pure wine. Drink: 2006-2012.’
Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2004 93 Points
‘The thing about the Majellas this year is the oak integration – this is a terrific marriage of oak and fruit. You can feel vanillin oak as it crosses your tongue but it barely raises a flavour, the grainy, ashen-flecked rise of the blackcurranty fruit entirely in control. There’s quite a bit of acid and quite a lot of style, and it’s gone into the bottle beautifully – for pure delivery of honest, vineyard-driven, naturally-balanced flavour, Majella is very hard to beat. Drink: 2006-2015.’
Majella Coonawarra Merlot 2004 90 Points
‘First release. Limited production. Very fruity style-packed with raisins and mulberry and dates, caramel oak touching up the very edges. Quite a lovely wine. Will age well medium term. Trademark Majella tannins – soft and fine and woven deep into the background of the wine. Pure drinking pleasure. Drink: 2006-2012.’
Canberra Sunday Times
30th July 2006
By Chris Shanahan
Majella Coonawarra Merlot 2004
‘Majella’s first ever merlot, a stunner, and a blinder cabernet lead a raft of new releases from the Lynn family’s very special patch of dirt down in Coonawarra. From experience the cabernet ages beautifully, maintaining pure varietal character as it mellows over time. And if you think merlot is either green, tough and weedy or light, sweet and soft, try this one to see how elegant and refined but still quite firm this variety can be. Another standout, at $17, is the 2005 ‘The Musician’, a fruity and soft cabernet shiraz blend – all from the Majella vineyard – made specifically for early drinking.’
The Advertiser (Australia)
8th March 2006
By Philip White
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2003 94 Points
Majella The Musician 2003 91 Points
The Wine Report 2006
By Tom Stevenson
Australia
Greatest-quality Wines
Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 Majella
The Age
24th January 2006
By Ralph Kyte-Powell
Majella Shiraz 2003 ****
'Shiraz doesn't quite achieve the reputation of Coonawarra's cabernet but the best are excellent. Majella's dense, purplish '03 is still youthful with an essency nose of blackcurrants, red berries and a whisper of coconutty oak. The palate has lovely intensity, defined tangy flavour and fine tannins. Oak is in good measure but not dominant. Ageing? Yes, two to eight years. Food ideas: Minute steaks; grilled spiced chicken.'
The Age
Wine Lesson
November 2005
By Sally Gudgeon
Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2003
'This will cellar for 10 years but if you drink it now decanting will bring out the blackcurrant and redcurrant aromas, spice and vanilla. Try it with beef stir fry.'
The Courier Mail
Cellar Notes
November 2005
By Ken Gargett
Majella 'The Musician' Cabernet Shiraz 2004
'One of the best-value wines on the market from SA's Coonawarra, and made in an unashamedly approachable manner. Black cherries, mint, coffee beans and notes of mocha. Delicious. Rating 92/100.'
Gourmet Traveller Wine
October/November Issue
By Campbell Mattinson
Wines to Watch - Taught & Terrific
'Others could learn from this quartet of winemakers who don't always play by the book but produce potent wines with unique characteristics. Top marks.'
'Majella never makes a great fuss but always makes an impact. They have two new wines out, both of which are so good you can't drink them without reaching for the phone to order more. The first is the 2004 Majella The Musician Cabernet Shiraz, all bramble and blackcurrant and dust and very low in oak. It's pure Coonawarra fruit, and it's lovely. The second is luxurious 2003 Majella Coonawarra Cabernet. This is a serious wine: sweet, long and curranty, with excellent form and complete deliciousness tattooed on every glass. I love it.'
Paul Ippolito Talks Wine
September Edition 2005
By Paul Ippolito
Majella "The Malleea" 2002
'This is a classic Coonawarra Cabernet-Shiraz red blend from a much respected winery in South Australia. Deep, dark and brooding as it comes out of its bottle into the glass, where magnificent purple crimson hues emanate. Power and complexity ensue, accompanied by elegance. The fruit character is pure, concentrated and carries potency that promises much. Dominant ripe rich blackberry and blackcurrants abound, with a touch of mint, ample liquorice and classic dark rich chocolate. The fruit tannin structure is smooth, velvety. Ample bodied, the length is breathtaking and lingers forever with a distinct berry driven combination of flavours coupled with spicy overtones. The cigar box characters interact seamlessly into the powerful fruit components. There is also an intimacy to how the various components of the wine weave together to deliver the goods. And that they do, as this is one smashingly good wine. An outstanding wine, drinking very respectably right now, but with a future of a least 10 plus years of further positive development. Have on you own, in a small dark corner where no one else can see you and come over and demand a taste. Have this all to youself, maybe with table Romano chees. Outstanding drink. Go on, spoil yourself.'
Master Grocer's Association (Australia)
Independent Retailer
August 2005
New Majella Vintage
The Musician Cabernet Shiraz 2004
'The Musician Cabernet Shiraz proved to be a popular success. It offers exceptional value for money, bursting with vibrant fruit characters (and estate grown).'
Divine
Aug/Oct 2005
By Michael Davey
The Musician 2004 Majella
'An estate grown cabernet sauvignon an shiraz blend, The Musician is a celebration of vibrant Coonawarra fruit. The colour is strikingly black with a lively deep purple edge. Blackcurrant, anise and spearmint aromas come without the resonance of wood, making for a pure expression of youthful Coonawarra fruit. Cabernet takes the lead on its medium-to full-bodied palate that's loaded with blackcurrant pastille, spearmint, black jelly-beans and sage flavours, with the shiraz providing smooth backing. Balance and harmony come from soft, ripe tannins which ensure that this young Coonawarra red leaves you wanting and encore.'
Sunday Canberra Times
21st August 2005
By Chris Shanahan
A wonderful glut
A clutch of Coonawarra winemakers is out to prove the area is ground-zero for diversity.
'Even in Coonawarra - Australia's cabernet sauvignon heartland - there's surplus production and declining average grape prices. With this uncomfortably in mind, four of the region's most-loved family operators hit Canberra this week to spruik regional versatility and to confront a notion being put about by some overseas commentators that Aussie wine is "industrial" and all tastes the same.
You could apply that notion with some accuracy, perhaps, to our fruity mult-million case varietal blends. But to miss the many thousands of hand-crafted wines from diverse varieties and sites is sheer ignorance. We've never before had so many excellent and distinctive wines at hand.
What the Coonawarra gang of four demonstrated was that even in what is probably Australia's flattest, most highly concentrated wine region, diversity exists - even amongst near neighbours.
But it's not something you necessarily expect as you drive through Coonawarra.
The Riddoch Highway runs north south, smack through an ocean of vineyards, rippling either side of the road for 20-odd kilometres.
In 2004 those 5.5,000 ha of vines produced a record 62,251 tonnes of grapes - enough to make about 4.7 million dozen of bottles of wine.
Cabernet sauvignon - the variety now in significant oversupply in Australia - constituted 36,000 tonnes of the total, equal to 58 per cent of the entire regional crush or 66 per cent of all reds.
Throw in the related varieties; cabernet franc, merlot, malbec and petit verdot, and the cabernet family constitutes 76 per cent of the red crush and 66 per cent of the total.
That all Coonawarra cabernet is not the same shows in the range of prices paid for the variety in 2005. Growers received as little as $200 and as much as $3600 a tonne for an average price of $1036.
Alarmingly, that average price was down from $1146 in 2004 and the 2004 average price had been less than that paid in 2003.
The cabernet price spread ($200 to $3600 a tonne) reflects the diversity of quality and styles coming from the district, a point our visiting gang of four was keen to point out in Canberra.
They come from one of Australia's better-promoted districts. Yet the four - Hollicks, Bowen Estate, Majella and Balnaves - appeared keen to promote the common themes of Coonawarra and family ownership while emphasising the marked style differences apparent even amongst near neighbours.
Why is it, for example, that Hollicks 2004 Riesling seems floral and musk-like, while nearby Majella's smells and tastes more lemon-like? Or why is that shiraz from the four properties ranges from fragrant and ethereal to quite savoury and dense? Or that cabernet sauvignon can be perfumed, leafy and elegant or powerful, tight and tannic?
The answer lies partly in winemaking practice. But, overwhelmingly, especially as the reds age, what we see are aroma, flavour and structural differences created by the different vineyards.
What the Lynns, Hollicks, Balnaves and Bowens share is a deep familiarity with their vines. They know what to expect from various plots, patches and rows. To them the sea of vines you and I perceive is, to them, an elaborate, familiar and more or less predictable patchwork. They know the wine flavours that each patch produces.
And that is what makes their wines so interesting and different from one another.'
The Age (Australia)
August 2005
By Ralph Kyte-Powell
2003 Majella Cabernet Sauvignon ****
'The zippy nose has a minty, spicy edge to tart, blackcurrant fruit. Well measured cedary oak is less apparent than in some early Majella reds, and the middleweight palate is fine and fresh with agreeably ripe tannins.'
The Gourmet Traveller
August 2005
By Max Allen
Top Drops of The Month
Bargain
The Musician Cabernet Shiraz, Coonawarra
'Majella is one of the top names in Coonawarra, and given that this superb-value red is sourced entirely from the estate vineyards, it's no surprise that its quality is impeccable…'
Winefront Monthly Edition 36
August 2005
By Campbell Mattinson
2005 Langton's Classification of Australian Wine: Snapshot
Wines that have leapt ON to the 2005 Langton's Classification:
Majella The Malleea Coonawarra Cabernet-Shiraz (Outstanding)
Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon (Distinguished)
2005 Langton's Classification of Australian Wine: ANALYSIS
The Victors, and don't they deserve it……
Majella the Malleea Cabernet-Shiraz and Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon:
'For some reason I nearly always prefer the varietal Majella cabernet to the more expensive blend….'
'Majella shiraz is a solid performer, offering excellent quality and value each year,' Majella Shiraz 2003 - 88 Points
'Step up to the plate, this is a good'un.' Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2003 -
92 Points
Paul Ippolito Talks Wine - Volume 2 Number 7
E-Newsletter - July 2005
By Paul Ippolito
Majella 'The Musician' Cabernet Shiraz 2004
'Majella has long been a brand name synonymous with top shelf wine quality. This wine represents the brand's foray into the lower end of the market. Quite a complex wine over-all given it's youth….it's very well priced for a wine of this ilk from a winemaker of this note.'
Decanter
July 2005
By Richard Bampfield
Buying Guide to Australian Shiraz - Definitive styles of Shiraz are emerging from Australia's different regions, so much so that Barossa could soon have its own appellation for the variety.
Majella Shiraz, Coonawarra - ***
'Sweet, pure fruit aromas, strong - US oak in the background - appealing..'
Winefront Monthly
June 2005
Campbell Mattinson
Majella The Musician Cabernet Shiraz 2004
'It's a great idea and they've pulled it off admirably. The wine is very low in oak and very high in fruit, a smidge of vanillin oak showing faintly through the mid palate but otherwise brambly blackcurrant demands all the attention.'
The Australian
June 2005
Max Allen
Taste - The Shiraz List
Majella the Musician Cabernet Shiraz
'…wonderfully vibrant, unmistakably Coonawarra to smell and taste, bursting with flavours of blackcurrant mulberry and herbs, it's fine elegant and juicy..'
The Sunday Times (Western Australia)
June 2005
By Peter Forrestal
Vibrant Tribute - A wine honouring a budding young musician killed in a car crash is a magical drop.
'The Musician Cabernet Shiraz had its genesis in one of Prof Lynn's trips to Asia where he had countless inquiries from sommeliers asking him for a wine that was priced so it could be sold by the glass. It needed to be youthful, have depth of flavour, a touch of oak, be low in tannins and be immediately approachable…It has been made exactly in the style that was requested and is also a magical tribute to Matthew.'
www.quaff.com.au
May 2005
By Max Allen
2004 Majella The Musician Cabernet Shiraz
'Tony Keys got this one right. Tony writes an online wine industry newsletter - www.thekeyreport.com.au - and recently penned a lengthy article inspired by tasting this wine. The musician pictured on the label is Matthew Lynn, a talented guitarist killed in a hit-and-run accident earlier this year at the age of 20. Matthew's father, Brian 'Prof' Lynn, is Majella's owner, and he has named the wine in honour of his son. As Tony pointed out, it's incredibly hard to be objective, then, when tasting, 'knowing the pedigree of (the wine's more expensive) siblings, (knowing) the family that produced it, the story behind the name.' So I thought the only option was to put the wine in a blind line-up of similarly-priced 2004 reds - in which it absolutely shone. This is simply an exceptional wine at the price: vibrant, unmistakably Coonawarra to smell and taste, bursting with flavours of blackcurrant, mulberry and herbs, and fine, elegant and juicy in the mouth. A bargain.'
Rating: Bloody Good
The Canberra Sunday Times
May 2005
By Chris Shanahan
The Musician by Majella Coonawarra
'Majella is one of the great Coonawarra estates making a rich, complex, elegant reds built to satisfy and last. The Musician brings a drink-now red to the range without sacrificing the wonderful fruit flavours that underpin all of the Majella wines...'
Top 250 Wines of the Year 2005
Matthew Jukes
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon, 2001 - Blockbuster
This is a first class Aussie Cabernet and it really shows what can be done with attentive viticulture and inspirational winemaking, 2001 Majella Cabernet is a near-perfect wine. It is thirty or so pounds cheaper than some of its peers and yet it has more vitality and regional expression than I could possibly wish for in any one bottle. You are a lucky person if you snare some of this wine. Bravo Prof.
Wine International Australia Terroir Tasting, March 2005
90 Points
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 Coonawarra, South Australia. ‘Minty, with blackcurrant fruit.'
87 Points
Majella Shiraz 2002 Coonwarra, South Australia. ‘An open, sweet vanilla nose with a sweet, commercial, jammy palate.'
The Age
Jane Faulkner, Good Drinking; 12/02/2005
Top Aussie
Majella Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2002
‘Majella consistently produces one of the best cab savs from the region famous for this variety.'
The Sydney Morning Herald
Huon Hook; 11/01/2005
Good Drinking;
Wine Listing Slightly
The 10 best Australian wines of the past year.
Majella Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 ‘Is this just too much of a good thing ? Not in my book. It is undeniably one of the most exuberant, purple hued, mountain-stream fresh, fruit-crammed cabernets you're ever likely to taste.'
Gourmet Traveller
Wine Huon Hooke,
Summer 2004
92 * * * *
2002 Majella Cabernet, Coonawarra
‘Pristine blackurrant, blackberry, crushed-leaf varietal flavours leap from the glass. This concentrated, vibrant cabernet is very regional and has a firm spine of ripe tannin to ensure its longevity. '
Majella,
Coonawarra, Australia
Canberra Times
March 2004
Top Drops Majella Coonawarra, Cabernet Sauvignon & Shiraz
'…..from one of Coonawarra's great estates, owned by Anthony and Brian Lynn, both show fruit intensity and tight structure of this cool vintage. There's a leafy edge to the cabernet but it's a complexing element, not a sign of greenness, in a wine that's pure class from go to wo. The Shiraa, too, is a knockout bring elegant but plush.'
Decanter August 2004
Red Centre Of Excellence
Campbell Mattinson
Coonawarra, with its famous terra rossa soil, has long held a reputation for great Cabernet Sauvignon, but the region is now adding to its portfolio with a list of acclaimed super-premium wines as well.
Best Value Coonawarra
Majella, Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2001 ****
Easy drinking, attractive young Cabernet. Blackcurrant, cedar, a chocolatey richness, spurts of olive and dusty/chalky tannins. Majella leads the new charge of Coonawarra - it's easy to see why.
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