Ep. 36 Monty Waldin interviews VIA Italian Wine Ambassador Kevin Gagnon | Education meets Business

Italian wine podcast. Chinching with Italian wine people. Hello. My name is Monte Walden. This is the Italian wine podcast with me today is Kevin Gagnon, who is a freelance writer based in Fryburg in Germany, but you're Canadian a Canadian citizen. Is that right? That's correct. A bit of a mix. Just can we join the dots on that? What are you doing in Germany? Well, my original career was as a classical singer, and so, Europe in general and Germany in particular are very convenient for those of us that don't like to travel thousands of kilometers to to go from job to job. So Germany was the answer. It's a wonderful place. So a classical singer, can we just enlarge on that a little bit? Absolutely. I, my my studies began in philosophy, and then I, transferred into the music faculty at the university in Western Canada, where I was, to become an opera singer and and concert singer, and then, decided to move to Germany pretty early on because like I said, the the the environment is excellent for it. After having moved to Germany, I, thanks to the very, enjoyable circumstances with the economics. Good wine was much lot cheaper than it was in Canada. And I fell in love with wine while I was there. So you were a very successful singer then. Yeah? I wouldn't say very successful. I'm certainly a successful singer. I've certainly lived from it for the last fifteen years. So that was good. So so just, you know, just to find out a little bit more about this part of your life, when you were small, did you singing when you're small? Not until I was seventeen years old. So what what happened? Do your parents push you to be a singer? Not at all. In fact, they they supported me throughout the entire time, and regardless of what I wanted to do. I originally was going to be a lawyer, and that's actually not an uncommon situation for singers. Most of us studied something else. It was a late thing. I I got into the theater, started to sing and whatnot. But then went to university directly and was gonna follow my my original plans to become a lawyer. And what happened was I enjoyed singing so much more and realized that I might be compromising a little bit on my personal ethics to to become a a prosecution lawyer for the crown in Canada and decided to follow the singing thing for a little while instead. And it worked out pretty well when a lot of competitions got a bit of a name. It kind of, yeah, developed organically, as they say. Okay. And so your your passion though was was wine. Is that correct? Very early on. And Italian wine in general? Italian wine was a was a really early passion because the Italians have more native varieties than anybody else in the world. I love French wine too. Don't get me wrong, but it was just so fascinating. You you travel the length and breadth of Italy, and you encounter varieties from from village to village that are that are sometimes completely different. And, for a person that's into any kind of culture or literature, for example, you don't read the same book every night. Why would you drink the same wine every night? It was, for me, it was extremely interesting. So I got involved very early on with with the native varieties and and the different little appylations. I so they don't call them appylations, of course, but they're denominations. And once you start descending that particular rabbit hole, it's really hard to turn back. And Germany's a great market for that. They have a they have a really low per bottle price as the statisticians like to say, but it doesn't really matter because the, because the import market is really strong. So you can get not everything, but you can get really, an extremely broad variety of wines in Germany that come from Italy. It's also not particularly far away, particularly from a Canadian perspective. It's not far away from, from the southern border. Fryberg is Southern Germany. It is indeed. But I was the first ten years in Hamburg. That was that was a bit interesting because, because there's no vineyards at all in Hamburg. And the, the, handziatic people of Hamburg, they they like the good wine. So they're, they're, they're pretty happy to give out a couple of euros to, to buy a decent bottle. Barton is a wine region, so it's a little bit different. Where where Fry is in Barton. Exactly. Fryberg is in Barton. It's, it's the it's not the capital, of course, because that Stuttgart, badenburg, but Treberg is the most important city in the wine region. But what will you do? Are you driving down at weekends across, you know, through Switzerland down into down into Italy? Literally. Yes. Absolutely. It's so close that for a Canadian in particularly, Nuance is not even six hours away. For us, that's a day trip. So you go down. You head to you're into Piedmont immediately. And you can get Barolo and Babaresco and Timurasso, which is one of my favorite white grapes from a from a tine. It's only from a, for Colittonese in in Piedmont. It's a tiny little place. But, did you get this wine that that that is magical with capers and and vinegar and and salt, which is which is really hard to pair with wines. So, you know, you find a wine that works with that kind of a dish. You you don't forget it. You know, that's something that's really special. Because you have quite Italian looks. You're very strong features. You've got a bit of stubble. Just the nose isn't it. Yeah. I've got a nose is all of it. But, you know, if I make you in Italy, I would think you're an Italian. Right? It's a bit of an advantage. I have to admit. When I turn up and add an Italian, winemaker or French for that matter, they they don't generally approach me as a foreigner. And, and so it's nice. You know, you get into conversation really quickly. The Italians are when they realize that you're interested in their wine, it's it's honestly a little bit difficult to get them to stop talking about it, which is which is wonderful because you learn so much about them, about the family, about the wines, the vineyards, the region, the history. I mean, it's it's a complete package. And, and honestly, for for native varieties, there's nothing better. Than finding out about what's going on about the whole thing. And the family is a is a it is a really significant part of that because these people are proud of their local grapes, and they have a good reason to be. They're very often of really high quality. And the fact that, that the the wider world doesn't necessarily know it might be a bit of a stretch to say it's a tragedy, but but it's something that that definitely begs to be addressed. And knowing these people and seeing how passionate they are about wines, that are really fine. It makes it pretty easy to to talk about it to other people later on. So you made your road trips from Fryburg down to Piamonte, which is, maybe a seven six seven hour drive. Our maximum. Six hours. Six hours. So how far south have you been? The farther south of business to to Naples. That's, it's a bit of a longer drive, of course. You were driving in Naples? Yeah. I'm not gonna do that again anytime soon, but it's it it was certainly an educational experience. They're very exciting. Yeah. Exactly. You just gotta forget there aren't there aren't you just pretend that there are no road signs. Well, you know, it's more of a suggestion than an actual law. It's it's it's an interesting place. No. I think next time when I go, I'm gonna stick to tax season, and walking about and the trains as far as they go. So your next trip? The next trip will absolutely be to, Abruzzo and the market because I've, particularly at this course. I've I've discovered a couple of wines that I definitely need to find out more about. The names, the great varieties of which For example, in in, in Bruso, the Monteciano is the is the main variety. And what we get in Germany is mostly a little bit more simple than what's available. And the market has got a little variety called tinteliana that that that is there's a really tenic, very, very dark variety. It's into Jana. And it's it's something that I definitely wanna try to get a little bit more about. It's it's only in this in this area. It's actually Melissa, not the market, but but that's rate, rate, rate next to it. When you present producers, do you tell them what your previous career was as a singer? I try not to. Not because they'd love to hear your voice. I'm sure. Well, they actually quite often come across the fact that I'm a singer because they give you the voice. They no. They don't do that unless I unless I mean, I actually beg them not to most of the time. It's, there's something about the timbre of the voice. They they know it's quite quick. Clear that from the laugh from the from the pitching that that, I'm at least in the theater or in in singing, that's not something that they that they miss. Italians are pretty good with music. So what we need to do is create an Italian wine Roon, have you sing it? Yeah. That's it's funny. It's, there's a lot of music about, about about wine, but, a lot of it's French. The the Italians are famous for the Brundisis, the the drinking songs, and there's some really famous ones from Travis for example. The it offers a lot of opportunities. Why and music go together very well? And other things do too. We'll leave it there. Thanks very much for coming in today. We're fascinated to talk to you and, count me in on the next road trip you make to Italy. Fantastic. Fantastic. So you just come you just drive past just Karen heading south. I'll do the driving in Naples. Right? Brilliant. I'd appreciate that. Thanks for coming in. Thank you. Follow Italian wine podcast on Facebook and Instagram.