From time to time

we mention the various small events that take place at the ranch (shown in the logo image at the top of every web page) but we always seem to keep these things a bit of a secret. It is not on purpose that we are so elusive, it just takes so much effort when the "staff" is just family and friends (there are no 'hired hands'), the General Manager is the cook, the owner is assistant cook and major domo, the chef is a wife, the waitress is a wife and all the guests are themselves pressed into service or left to their own devices. Casa Cassara is truly a family affair and it takes everyone to make these things happen, leaving little time to publicize the happening. However, we just had a terrific event for a very small number of very fortunate fans.

What we had was a barrel tasting,

tri-tip barbecue and country singer/songwriter concert all rolled into one with about 25 folks including grandparents and children. It started off about 5:00 PM at the ranch house with John Krska announcing, "Everyone get a wine glass, we're going down to the winery for a barrel tasting." There was a stampede! And then about fifteen of the throng were seen hiking down the driveway toward the winery, each with a wineglass in hand and very little idea what they were in for. Down at the winery, which is right next to the ranch manager's house, everyone descended the stairs to the barrel room and formed a circle around John, wondering what was to happen.

John is a story teller by nature,

so combined with his huge knowledge born of personal experience, he generally enthralls the crowds. He first explained about the barrels: vintages are spread across new and old barrels when aging and then combined before bottling so as to average the barreling effects. He then talked about how the barrels breath and have to be "topped off" to refill the dead spaces at the top so that air does not get in and allow the wine to rot. As he is holding forth, he climbs up on the stacked barrels, knocks out the plug, and proceeds to pipette yellow fluid from a barrel into a decanter, never missing a beat in his story. Then down he hops and proceeds to poor a good slug of fluid into each glass held out in anticipation. It is an interesting flavor, although weak and not particularly sophisticated yet, although it has a very pleasant tang.

Suddenly John is talking about blushes,

how skins are removed, about crushing, about the natural settling out of the natural fining impurities, almost like sand, how the grapes really can't be washed clean to remove most of this stuff before hand because that traps water in the clusters that then gets into the grape juice. We are looking down at a pallet of glass bottles and old beer kegs and can see the sludge that has settled out from these containers that are used to top off the barrels. To the uninitiated this is a wonderous story. And then John is off breaking into another barrel, siphoning off some purple grape juice with dripping running down from the hole and staining the barrel. We learn that barrels only last about five years before they must be replaced. The purple juice is poured into the now empty glasses. There is a little question period. I am busy trying to remember to shoot some pictures for this article, sigh. There is so much to know.

I trudge back up the driveway to the main house to find Rick Barker of Nashville to You, father of Acoustic Radio Tours, firing up the barbecue pit and working on his ribs ... an appetizer to hold the troops until Dan cooks up the tri-tip. There are children running around everywhere like wildmen. There is smoke wafting down from the pit. There are other munchies set out on the big table in the diningroom. I am hungry and I devour some sausage bites!

Pretty soon the entire caravan has hiked back up the driveway to the main house and there is a constant change over of people in the seats at the dining table. Sausage plates are replaced by platters of ribs and Rick holds forth on his recipe, answering questions from ladies held in rapt attention over his techniques. And now the children are running around and around the fireplace. Tri-tip arrives with beans and garlic bread. There is a certain silence that settles in as everyone has their mouths full.

Finally we are summoned into the great room,

to settle onto couches arrayed around the massive fireplace that forms the core of this grand home at the very top of the flattest place on the estate. Here are four young people sitting on the circular fireplace hearth: three guys with guitars and gorgeous svelte young woman with long dark hair and a jaw dropping smile. There is a little discussion among them and then there is the sound of a guitar ... it is Danielle's accompaniest, Mike Ulvila and suddenly she is singing, "I Don't".. Something is very different here. There is both a closeness and clarity that I am not used to and it is hard to appreciate that it is because I am ten feet away from a world class artist, just about to release a new video, and I'm sitting there already satiated from eating and drinking with her: Danielle Peck, rising country singer/songwriter artist with Big Machine Records, ten feet away, singing just to us, without pretentions or a big band or stage lights and smoke. Just her and us and the kids running around and around the huge fireplace on which she sits. It is simply magical.

She finishes.

We applaud. It is very special. Then the other two guys exchange looks and they launch off into a whirlwind of sound, song and fury, "Everything or Nothing". BrittonJack, the dynamite duo: Britton Cameron and Jack Sizemore. The sound is enormous and the energy blazing. Danielle and her guitarist are swept in and the four of them are working the tune. Then it's back and forth between the two pairs, "Isn't That Everything", "Doghouse", Kiss You on the Mouth", "Worth the Wait", "Findin' a Good Man" (of which her video is on the way), "These are The Days","Something to Talk About", and "Loving You Is Killin' Me". Thunderous sound, quiet femininity, banging on the back of the guitar, delicate riffs, masculine, feminine: we applaud, we applaud, we applaud. Then it is over.

Everyone has had a good time.

Got a little buzz on. Ears still hearing the echoes. Danielle is making sure everyone has had a good time and has stories to tell. There is guitar talk going on. I pack up my cameras. Dan wants a couple of pictures. I unpack a camera ... I am still floating along in that magical place where four world class country artists have just performed for me from ten feet away and I have had the privilege to photograph them. What's a few more pictures for Dan?

Review by Dwight McCann, photographer and friend of the Casa Cassara Vineyard and Winery.