Above: a recent photo of Donato d’Angelo with his wife Filomena and daughters Erminia and Emiliana (via the winery’s Facebook).
The Italian wine world mourns the loss of Donato d’Angelo, 73, who passed away last week.
Donato was widely considered the “father” of Aglianico del Vulture. He left his native land as a young man to study enology in the north. When he returned, he brought much needed know-how to wine growers there.
But he also brought back something even more important: a finely-tuned international palate and a wide-reaching vision for the wines grown on the volcanic slopes of their hallowed Mt. Vulture.
Today, he is credited with single-handedly reviving the Aglianico del Vulture appellation and ushering it into the contemporary age of viticulture and wine tastes.
His death was reported by nearly every leading wine guide and by Italian mainstream media as well.
I first met Donato two decades ago when I was working with the family’s importer in New York and was blown away by how good the wines were.
My friendship with Filena, Donato’s wife, always made their stand my first stop each year at Vinitaly, the industry’s main trade event.
One year, I headed straight to their stand only to find that Donato wasn’t there. Even Filena had no idea where he was.
About five minutes after I arrived, we spotted Donato walking slowly toward us with another man at the other side of the hall. As the two approached us, Filena and I couldn’t believe her eyes: the man with Donato was Piero Antinori!
Piero, we discovered, had run into Donato and asked him to guide an impromptu tasting for him. The four of us sat at the table as Piero fixated on every word that Donato shared and every wine he poured.
It was one of the most memorable experiences of my career. The fact that Piero had expressly asked Donato to “taste him on” the wines (as we say in the biz) is an indication of the role that he played in our industry.
Sit tibi terra levis Donate.
Jeremy Parzen 
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