Brundlmayer Zobinger Heiligenstein Lyra Riesling 2014

The wine is named for the Y-shaped trellising system that increases canopy, thus shading the grapes and increasing photosynthesis. It also “looks like the vine is throwing its arms up toward the sun,” says Willi (poetically!), who adds, “And it shows that you don’t need old vines to give great Riesling.” I show you the ’14 basically for-the-record, as it won’t be released until 2016, not to mention any sensible person would jump on the grandiose 2013. I’m starting to sense that Lyra is a music that’s begun to write itself. Willi’s early goal was to show the utmost rapture of fruit, as an alpha to the omega of the Alte Reben and its darker gravitas. But for the last three vintages, Lyra has become almost overwhelmingly beautiful. It isn’t just fruit any more, and what began as a rapture has changed to a kind of apotheosis of fruit toward a gleaming and complicated divinity. The wine remains ecstatic, but these things are never earned easily. ’13 is graceful and massive, dense and weightless, a whirligig of complexity in which a hundred elements glide in an esoteric dance, moving quickly, stepping lightly; it has the focus and the beatific glow of Alzinger (and his wines!), somehow both serene and hyperactively intricate. The ’14 Lyra, which we’ll see in January 2016, is really green and herbal; it has its usual beaming countenance but in a different key than usual, like a parfait of each green leaf.