Bartolo Mascarello, 78; Italian Winemaker Stuck to Tradition

Bartolo Mascarello, 78, who produced some of Italy’s most renowned wines using strictly traditional methods and refused to bow to technological advances, died Saturday at his home in Barolo. He had experienced heart problems for many years and died of cardiac arrest.

In the hills around his native town, Mascarello produced some of the greatest examples of Barolo, perhaps the region’s most famous red wine.

He inherited the small family business from his father and tried to keep things as they had always been -- from picking the best grapes to hand-drawing the labels for some of his bottles.

Made from Nebbiolo grapes mostly from the Cannubi vineyard, Mascarello’s Barolo could offer distinctive scents of rosebushes and delivered an intensity of flavor. He also produced a Barbera, but he refused to follow the lead of other Italian colleagues and plant French grape varieties.

“No cabernet, no merlot, no chardonnay and no wines with invented names,” his daughter, Maria Teresa Mascarello, quoted him as saying. He was equally conservative about marketing, shying away from big trade fairs and preferring that knowledge of his wine be passed along by word of mouth.

Mascarello’s Barolo received high marks from American wine critics Robert Parker and Stephen Tanzer.