Partying with the Saint of Wine

There is a very special wine festival that happens every year in Burgundy. Sadly I missed it this year, but reporting from the front is our Australian friend Derek. He lives with his Canadian partner Debbie in the village where the festival took place. Debbie and our friend Julie, a Californian who lives in France part of the year, were our photographers. Mille mercis to the three of them for today’s great post.

Many places have their annual festival. New York has its Macey’s Thanksgiving Day parade and Boston has its marathon. Well Burgundy has its Saint Vincent Tournante. So what is a tournante? Tournante in French simply means ‘rotating’ and this is a festival that is shared among 30 villages in the wine region of Burgundy around Beaune. Each year the festival moves to another village until they’ve all had a turn. But why Saint Vincent? Being named after a saint certainly lends gravitas to the event and the day does begin with a morning march of the faithful through the vineyards accompanied by brass and percussion instruments. Each village is represented and carries a carved wooden image of the ‘saint’ bearing the village’s name. And even though the two day festival begins on a Saturday, there is full mass in the village church after the parade.

But there were many possible Saint Vincents from history and the best explanation for the use of the name for the festival seems to be that ‘Vincent’ begins with the word ‘vin’ (wine).  And the local vignerons need no better reason to celebrate the saint than that.

This was Puligny-Montrachet’s third turn at hosting the festival, the previous time being in 1991. So it was a much anticipated event in the village and preparations began at least three years before. The four elements, earth, air, fire and water were to be the theme and the whole village was decorated in the colors and symbols of these themes.

Umbrellas for the "water" theme…

…and hot air balloons for the "air" theme

Our part of town was to be ‘water’ and so we decorated our courtyard gate with blue paper and prehistoric sea animals. Not immediately apparent why perhaps, but I’m told this region was under water in the Jurassic, and this is what created the calcareous soils so favourable to wine making. All the locals got into the spirt of things and the decorations were everywhere. Even the tree lined streets leading into the village were decorated, with every tree festooned with hand made paper flowers. There must have been tens of thousands of them.

A "montgolfière" done up in paper flowers, with a basket made of corks

Future wine drinker

Normally the Tournante is held in January in the depths of Winter but this year it was delayed by 14 months due to covid and so it was held in March 2022. As luck (or divine intervention) would have it, the weather on both days was perfect; sunny and warm (for March). There were bands and stilt-walkers and large crowds turned up in buses. Everyone clearly had a wonderful time tasting the many excellent local wines on offer and dining on some pretty decent takeaway food. I say ‘clearly’ because, as the day wore on, more and more people felt the urge to break into spontaneous song. These mini-chorales usually involved 4 to 6 people and could start up at any time.  The most common songs were about being proud to be from Burgundy (fair enough) or that peculiar little clapping song that people here sing with no real words but somehow sounding very French — La-la la-la la-la-lee-la-laira (the Ban Bourguignon) and sometimes of course, La Marseilles. 

A musical parade through the vines

So two days of fun and frivolity and then suddenly it was all over. The crowds slowly dissipated but the decorations remained up for another week. Now the village is back to normal and the serious business of making the wine is back in full swing. If you missed the event this year you can catch it next year in Fleys. But it won’t be as good as Puligny-Montrachet – how could it be?

Happily, this is not a real horse

Not surprisingly, some of the decorations feautred used corks

Derek, our writer today, and Debbie, our photographer

And our photographer Julie, amongst the paper flowers

In the COMMENTS: Thank you Sue, it is paradise to us. As you know, Patty, and we hope to see you soon. Natalia, Suzanne H, and Melinda are making soup! Love the idea of the jalapeños. Suzanne, it's a challenge to chop the squash, I see this as a husband task, or any strong person passing through the kitchen. Suzanne D., loved your bistro story. Been there!

Favorite TV :I think it's been around a while, but have you seen Murder in Provence, on Britobx? Witty dialogue and lots of French scenery porn. Inexplicably, they used British actors, pretending to be French. But if you can get over that, it's great fun.