Chambolle-Musigny
Chambolle-Musigny is a tiny commune in the Côte de Nuits sub-region of Burgundy.
It has a population of fewer than 400, but enjoys an historic and widespread reputation for its high-quality wines.
The village produces almost exclusively red wines from Pinot Noir. The classic Chambolle-Musigny wine is powerful, yet refined and perfumed. Along with Vosne-Romanée and Gevrey-Chambertin, the village is considered to produce some of the finest Pinot Noir wines on earth. The perfume which characterizes the wines has earned Chambolle a reputation as the ‘Volnay’ of the Côte de Nuits.
A minute quantity of white wine made from about half a hectare (1.2 acres) of Chardonnay grapes grown in the prestigious Musigny Grand Cru in the south of the appellation. No white wine is made under the village appellation, or at Premier Cru level.
(Le) Musigny is divided into two sections, Les Musigny and Les Petits Musigny, with slightly different soils and gradients. The latter is is the home of the Chardonnay parcel. However around 70 percent of the fuit harvested across the two plots is combined into a single bottling by Domaine Comte Georges de Vogüé.
Bonnes-Mares is the other Grand Cru vineyard, lying at the opposite end of Chambolle-Musigny. It generally produces wines with more structure, but less roundness and finesse, than those from Musigny. A small parcel of Bonnes-Mares lies in Morey-Saint-Denis. (© Proprietary Content, Wine-Searcher.)
Quality can vary among the Premiers Crus. Les Amoureuses has very similar soils to Musigny and is widely considered to be the finest. Les Charmes is also highly regarded. It too resembles Musigny in style.
The climate in Chambolle-Musigny – as throughout the wider Côte d’Or department – is of continental type. Seasonal and diurnal (day-night) temperature variation helps to establish balanced acids and sugars in the wines.
The village of Chambolle-Musigny itself is located on the upper mid-slope of the Côte d’Or escarpment, at an altitude of around 300m (1000ft). Wooded hilltops lie to the west.
Its vineyards lie immediately on three sides, on the slopes alongside and below the village. They stretch eastwards down the slope towards Bourgogne AOP zones and southwards to the edge of the neighboring village of Vougeot. Le Musigny and Les Petits Musigny extend further southwest in a corridor to the Premier Cru La Combe d’Orveau and the border with Flagey-Echézeaux. To the north lies Morey-Saint-Denis.
The lowest and highest of these sites qualify only for the communal appellation. The better vineyards sit on the fine, well-drained soils of the mid-slope.
There are 176 hectares (435 acres) of vineyards in total. Of this, 24 Chambolle-Musigny Premier Cru vineyards cover 56ha (138 acres). Its two Grand Crus together cover 24ha (59 acres).
Chambolle-Musigny was originally called simply Chambolle, but the name of its prize vineyard was added in 1882. This was a fashion of the time followed by twelve villages all along the Côte d’Or. Other notable examples include Aloxe-Corton and Puligny-Montrachet). The Musigny vineyard was classified in 1936 along with the communal Chambolle-Musigny appellation.
The Chambolle part of the name is a bastardization of champ bouillant, meaning ‘boiling (or bubbling) field’. This is a reference to the torrents of water which flow down the local slopes after heavy rainfall, when the nearby Grone stream bursts its banks.