2021 Sonnen Jannis Riesling

WINEMAKER: Luke Andree
REGION: Tamar River, TAS
VARIETAL: Riesling
VITICULTURE: Certified Organic

"Jannis is the name of my son and also of Jannis Melsheimer, the son of Thorsten. Jannis makes orange wine from his family’s fruit in the Mosel, so I felt like it was appropriate to name this wine after both of them. The Riesling from the St. Matthias Vineyard, Rosevears (kanamaluka/Tamar Valley) is grown on fertile clay loam with some granite outcrops. It was destemmed to a fermenter where it stayed for 90 days on skins. Luke's handing was pretty oxidative but the result was a pretty wine with a lovely savoury saline edge." - Luke

The journey into wine for Luke was not an obvious one. After moving to Melbourne in 2010 to pursue a physiotherapy degree and chase his dream of playing representative cricket he got a job working at his local Dan Murphy's. Bit by bit over his two years at Dan's he began to feel more intrigued and comfortable around wine and so after finishing his degree he decided to enrol back into university but this time at Charles Sturt for Viticulture and Winemaking. Whist studying he returned to Tasmania and spent a season pruning in the vines at Stefano Lubaina and a year working the wine bar and cellar door at Moorilla.

It was by chance at one of the first editions of Bottletops that he met Pat Underwood from Little Reddie and was struck by the world of minimal intervention wine. In late 2016 following this meeting he moved up to Victoria and completed his first vintage at the Boomtown Cooperative winery followed by a full season working at both Oakridge and then Mac Forbes where he spent most of his time helping to manage the vineyards. Post the 2019 harvest with Mac he jetted over to his father's homeland of Germany to complete vintage with fellow Lo-Fi winery Melshimer. Here he pursued his love of Riesling and worked closely with Thorsten in both the vines and cellar.

It was however, the time with Mac that really made him fall in love with the viticultural side of things and what led him back to Tasmania in late 2019 to head up the vineyard and cellar at the very ambitious Mewstone Wines. Here Luke manages almost 6 hectares under vine with the vineyard recently becoming certified organic and he helps make both the Mewstone and Hughes & Hughes wines in their new cellar at the home vineyard in Flowerpot. This is where he makes his Sonnen Wines.