JM Séleque Champagne Solessence Extra Brut NV
Jean-Marc Sélèque (say-lek) returned to Pierry in 2008 after internships at Chandon’s facilities in Napa Valley and in Australia’s Yarra Valley with a vision of what he wanted to do, and didn’t want to do at Champagne JM Sélèque. The latter was reinforced by his experiences at those two large production operations, where vineyard practices resulted in “corrections” having to be made in the cellar. The positive ideas were simple, but labor intensive: in the vines, shallow plowing of rows by horse or tractor for weed control; reducing yields by careful pruning; organic and biodynamic applications to boost the health of soil and vine.
In the cellar, he moved to much slower and more gentle fermentations, something he considers key for flavor and texture. He did this by lowering the temperature and working more with wild yeast (a lot of his fermentations are wild, but he’s not orthodox about that). He instituted longer aging on the lees for all the cuvées, both in barrel or tank and subsequently in bottle for the secondary fermentation (that bottling is now done at the end of July following the harvest, which is a long and relaxed élevage, allowing a young wine to come together). He did away with fining, and gradually did away with filtration (completely stopping in 2015 when his new cellar gave him the measure of control he needed). Finally, because his farming reforms resulted in better maturity in his grapes, he lowered the level of sugar in the final dosage. The dosage and other specifics are admirably detailed on Jean-Marc’s back labels.
Fundamentally, these ideas evolved from friendships with fellow reform-minded growers, who insisted that the road to authenticity would only be found by working closely with one’s vines, rather than from his enological studies. Currently, Champagne is arguably the most dynamic wine region in France—a country where almost nothing viticulturally is standing still any more—and it would be accurate to view Jean-Marc at the vanguard of this shift toward more artisanal farming and production. What may be most impressive, however, is how he has implemented his ideas with such openness and quiet confidence. He has taken the counsel of a who’s who list of cutting edge growers in Champagne, befriended many of them, and he makes a habit of visiting their ilk in the Loire Valley and in Burgundy. Likewise, he routinely receives fellow growers to his domaine.
The domaine began in 1965, when Jean-Marc’s grandfather started planting vines with the aid of his father-in-law (then the president of the Pierry co-op). Subsequently Jean-Marc’s father joined the domaine in 1974 after acquiring a degree in enology, and he did much to update the winery and augment its vineyard holdings.
When Jean-Marc came on board in 2008, he turned the domaine toward the organic viticulture he envisioned. In 2010, he started working biodynamically, and now all of his parcels are farmed organically and receive some biodynamic preparations, a fact that he doesn’t make much fuss about because for him it’s not about the label so much as it is about making better wine. (He has not gone for certification because he doesn’t want to be straitjacketed into using copper sulfites when, under certain conditions, a synthetic fungicide might be more benign.) Separately, he stopped his father’s practice of selling some grapes to négociants, and he began to acquire more oak vessels for fermentation and ageing on the lees. Today the ratio of oak to steel in the cellar is roughly 60/40, with the steel tanks being used primarily for the younger, fruitier Solessence and Solessence Rosé. He is, however, moving more toward oak every vintage. Since 2015, he’s been selling off his 228-liter barrels of late in favor of 350 and 600-liter barrels for fermentation and barrel aging. He buys barrels from over a half dozen top coopers, and typically the percentage of new oak for a given élevage is 5-10%. For certain younger vineyard parcels, he uses 20-hectoliter foudres, plus he’s experimenting with amphora and cigar barrels of various sizes (so-called because of their elongated shape). He’s played with a concrete egg but that vessel hasn’t impressed him.
These days, the grapes are decidedly in better health and are harvested with lower pHs and higher acidities (one result of healthier soils and deeper roots). As a result, beginning in 2011 Jean-Marc stopped the practice of introducing malolactic fermentation in barrel. Given the low pH, which greatly inhibits malo, this was easily done. Thus, increasingly, some wines have no ML, while some have a part, and some continue to have the ML completely realized.
Fast forward to notes from January, 2021: "Our goals for 2021 remain the same, to continue investing in the quality of our work and our wines. In particular, we plan to spend a larger part (2.5 ha) of our plots in horse plowing in order to best respect the integrity of our soils. These same plots are managed in eco-pastures in winter with sheep (Ouessant sheep from a farm located in Pierry) which allow us to maintain excellent plant cover without using machines for mowing. We are also investing in new, higher trellising systems which allow us to keep larger and taller foliage for the protection of the grapes from the sun. New wooden containers are planned for the next 5 years in order to store our reserve wines in the best conditions. And finally, we are close to the start of building additional bottle storage to allow for longer aging of certain wines before release."
The domaine has 22 acres of vines which grow in 45 parcels and lie across 7 different villages. The average vine age is a notable 40 years of age (positively wizened by Champagne standards!). Most of the vines grow in the communes of Pierry and then Moussy, followed by Epernay, Mardeuil, Dizy, Vertus, and Boursault. Some 50% of the vines are Chardonnay; 40% are Pinot Meunier; and 10% are Pinot Noir. Total annual production is around 5,500 cases.
