Usually, I’m being introduced as Sommelier, exploring the heights and depths of the world of wines through the lens of culture, joy and sensuality, bringing delight to guests, friends and strangers alike. Though I’d like point out tha..

“Hold on” - Let’s cut through the chase and address the elephant in the room. “What’s my favorite wine, you wonder?“

A preposterous question - how dare you.

Let me put it this way: For the time being, it is all about finesse. Specifically, cooler climate wines, vigorously overflowing with nuances, delicacies, grace, light feet, somewhat shy, sometimes only whispering, a silent firework, quiescent deep sea, exuberant shivers of Southern light.

“But Herr Tschudi” you might ask, “Are you out of your mind?”

Well, my attitude toward wine, approximates an attitude toward life: a process of becoming. Neither isolated, nor objective or static. Once you define the wine, you somewhat neglect the wine.

You see, I hand you a glass of white and let you know about the facets of white peach and green fig leaves. You either smell and taste them or you won’t. Yes or No - Zero or One - potentially a forgone conclusion. By aiming for objectivity, the engagement with wine not only becomes binary and static but also isolated in character.

Now, I give you that same glass and passionately point to the wine’s temperamental yet graceful and light feet akin to Degas’ danseuses.

This way, one creates an open-ended dialogue, eine lebendige Gestalt, a space to interpret, to fully breath and liv..

“Wait a second, what do you mean by equating wine with dance?”

My dear avid reader - please - enough of your perky questions.

Let me ask you in turn: Would you believe in a God who doesn’t know how to dance?
I’m glad you say that, neither would I.

(My kind of) dance, always was and always will be, in its essence an untamed movement: a process of becoming.

Wine and its perceptions(!) are not only ever-changing due to micro-biological activity but also due to temperature, exposure to air, type of glassware, social context and the most obvious yet vastly underestimated: mood. So please don’t kill the vibe, by throwing around static words like ‘lychees, maple syrup, dried apricots or lemon drop’.

“I’m confused, Max. So what are you then, may I ask?”

An incidence, tumbling into an exhibition on Rothko at The Tate Modern, sparked my passion and embrace for the world of uncertainty and the emergent bliss of exploration. Next to a wine guy & educator, I am an explorer, European, passioned lover of life, enthusiastic wild ocean swimmer, lucid dreamer, whole animal butcher-apprentice, embodied pasta-machine, relentless pursuer of aroma and fragrances, permeable stoic, and wandering experimentalist. I’m a sceptic yet an optimist. I’m all ears. Especially when it comes to Carl Jung and Gustav Mahler, fused together resemblant of Georges Laval’s Champagnes: velvety sparkling, brightly-pitched yet audaciously dark and seductive.

I’m a Heidelberg native of Swiss and Lithuanian descent, drawn to explore the world, especially wild coasts and stormy sea. Above all, my life’s telos is to teach when I am called upon, and fortunate when I’m taught.

The many interactions with winemakers, colleagues, craftsmen, artists, academics, philosophers, worldly-attuned and intimate strangers continue to feed my fire. I dream that these encounters, I get the privilege to experience, never burn out. 

And, I’m still more than that - I’m years of experiences. And I will be more things yet to (be)come. 

Max

An Ode to Clarity

Precisely because it is the thrown-open and infinite internet, I wish to shine light hereby on my inner and outer world.

Hearts are not had as a gift but hearts are earned
By those who are not entirely beautiful.

Yeats, 1921

Let me try to expose myself, and help transform wines’ being into becoming

Transplant hearts into professionals, and spirit into hedonists.