Month: March 2009

Danny and Christina Wysong met during freshman orientation at William and Mary. But they’d have to travel through other relationships—and continents—before arriving at their destination: each other.

During that first year of college, they were both dating other people. And sophomore year, Danny studied abroad in Russia. When summer came, he was working as a camp counselor and Christina (a Charlottesville native) was getting ready for her own international adventure—a semester in Spain. “She was freaking out about it,” says Danny. “I sent her a letter full of advice and helpful hints on dealing with the language barrier.”

From that kind gesture a correspondence was born, and a nice old-fashioned one at that, since Danny had no email or phone access at camp. In their letters, “We were clearly really getting along,” Danny says. They went electronic once Christina was in Spain. Finally, Danny says, “I just really snapped and sent her an email: ‘Hey, I like you!’ But a lot better framed than that.”

Then Danny started talking about a visit. “He kind of joked about it, and I encouraged it, but figured it would never actually happen,” Christina says. He was serious, though. “I sold all my textbooks and flew to Spain,” he says. “My parents were ready to murder me. My mom said ‘Well, you better marry her.’”

When he finally got off the bus in the town where Christina was living, he was “jetlagged out of my mind.” He’d told Christina he was coming (“I didn’t want to do the stalker-esque thing, creepy thing, and pop up behind her at a café”) so she was waiting on a bench in the central plaza. “We kind of hugged,” she remembers, “we kissed real quick, and he said ‘Will you go out with me?’ I said yes and we went and got ice cream.”

That was fall 2005. They both say their relationship worked, even long-distance, because of how comfortable they are together. “We kind of look at the world in the same way,” she says. And he adds, “I don’t have to curb myself or censor myself.” They stayed together through school and then a move to Arlington.

Danny proposed last April on a trip to Williamsburg (“directly after eating a chicken sandwich,” he says) and on October 5, 2008, exactly three years after Danny arrived in Spain, they got married at King Family Vineyards.

These two never neglect the lighter side. “Christina can raise one eyebrow very well,” says Danny. “She knows I find this very amusing, so she did this continuously throughout the ceremony, when I’m saying these super-serious things, like ‘I will be with you forever.’”

Kirsty Harmon is pouring her new wines; “new,” as in recently finished and bottled, but also new in that they represent the rebirth of Blenheim Vineyards. The winery, owned by Dave Matthews and family, has been shaken up since parting ways with original winemaker Brad McCarthy. Since its inception the winery’s reputation has been based as much on its rock star owner (and its rock star-ish winemaker), as on the wine. Now, nine years after its inception, Blenheim has a new winemaker. That would be Harmon. This being her first time in the spotlight, and with the stage being so big, does she feel any jitters?

“Of course I’m nervous,” she says with a laugh.

Born in Holland, Harmon moved to Charlottesville in 1989, attending Albemarle High School and then UVA, from where she graduated with a biology degree. Looking for a change from science, she took a job at the Kluge Estate Winery and Vineyard, where she met winemaker Gabriele Rausse. “My whole world changed,” she says, “my whole view of wine.” And voila! she had discovered a new passion and a new career. After several years working with Rausse, she went to the University of California at Davis, the country’s top wine program, to get her masters in viticulture and enology.

“My goal was always to come back to Virginia,” she says, which earned her the question in California: “You’re going where?” Now, following internships at top wineries in France and New Zealand, she’s answered that question by taking a job that brings her full circle, working a few feet from the vines she tended at Kluge and a stone’s throw from the winery of her friend and mentor Rausse.

We sit at a long wooden table and she pours the new Blenheim white wines. Gone are the handmade-looking labels, replaced by sleek and colorful new ones that feature a redesigned logo. Gone too are the corks. In their place: more modern screwcaps. There is a rosé for the first time and a new red jokingly called “Dave’s Blend” that will feature a label designed by the man himself. 

“My vision for the wines,” Harmon says, “is to make them very crisp, clean.” Only the whites are currently bottled, but they definitely fit that description. The Viognier, much dryer than most in Virginia, reminded me of lesser-known whites from the Cotes du Rhone. Her red wines are still in the barrel, and although the blends have not been finished, they seem of a piece with the whites. These are elegant, restrained wines meant to go with food. I like them a lot, but will the tasting room crowds, used to bigger reds and sweeter whites, respond?

Harmon can’t say yet. She doesn’t know the quality of all the fruit, isn’t yet intimate with every inch of the vineyards. That’s a process that takes years. “It really is going to be a discovery,” she says, “and an exploration. And hopefully that’s not too confusing for people.”

News Flash: Ted Burns, an Associate Professor of Neurology at UVA, co-owner of local importing company Williams Corner Wine, and, in his spare time, East Coast correspondent for the popular wine podcast Grape Radio, has been nominated for a James Beard Award for his recent podcast on Thomas Jefferson and wine. Congratulations, Ted!

Since buying a new iPod a few months ago, I’ve spent less time buying music and more time digging through records I already own—uploading old Magnetic Fields and Beck albums while I page through lyrics and liner notes, then digging around online for the best album cover image I can find to fit my iPod’s screen.

Then I hit my stack of local records, and the process becomes a bit more difficult.

Although it’s easy enough to find a wealth of local musicians on iTunes (Eli Cook and Sons of Bill are there, along with Jan Smith, John D’earth, Parachute and Shannon Worrell), I haven’t purchased a single album by a local band online. Which means that, for every physical album I have purchased from a local band and loaded onto my handheld rock box, I need to hunt around for album art to fill the void onscreen. Not a terribly difficult search, but one worth thinking about.

While stores like iTunes bundle digital music and art files together, finding both for a band like Beetnix or Horsefang or The Nice Jenkins—groups you won’t find in Apple’s music store—requires a bit more work. And should you—Bowie forbid!—want a CD with those tantalizing “Thank You” and production notes, well, you might need to work with more than a search engine.

This may be a fantastic thing for local music. By avoiding retailers like iTunes, some local bands have made listening an inherently local act.

A true audiophile needs to know where to dig up local tunes, be it at stores with local sections (the incredible shrinking Plan 9 Records at Albemarle Square, Sidetracks, the racks at Gravity Lounge or Rapunzel’s Coffee) or smaller online retailers that often have direct relationships with local acts. (Check out Record Theory.com, Monkeyclaus.org or, if you must, CDBaby.com.) He needs to know where the gig is, and how to find the merch table.

And while these local music retailers might not give you the easiest iPod upload for your buck, knowing them expands your listening options. By way of an example, here’s a list of locals you won’t find on iTunes, but might find elsewhere: Terri Allard, The Nice Jenkins, Jim Waive and the Young Divorcees, Truman Sparks, Horsefang, Rick Olivarez, Adam Smith and The Invisible Hand, The Beetnix, The Unholy Four, Casa de Chihuahua, Red Wizard.

As for the bigger bands…

Shopping local helps the little guy, sure, but let’s not anger the music gods: Feedback isn’t about to pass up a Metallica gig at John Paul Jones Arena or a David Byrne show at the Charlottesville Pavilion. And, as luck would have it, both shows—along with Pavilion concerts by Jackson Browne and George Jones—were announced last week in the Feedback blog. Read Feedback at c-ville.com for more.

Listen local: The Nice Jenkins (pictured) and a handful of other bands skip iTunes and sell their music at other sites and stores.