The JancisRobinson.com Podcast

Jancis Robinson, a distinguished wine writer and Master of Wine, shares her fascinating journey in the world of wine. She discusses the rise of Britain’s wine scene from the 1980s, her collaborations on the influential World Atlas of Wine, and the founding of her website. Jancis candidly reflects on her challenges, including health setbacks affecting her tasting ability, and her family dynamics as a 'Grancis'. She also addresses her advocacy for diversity in the wine industry and provides insights into the current state of wine consumption.

The Jancis Robinson Story is a seven-episode series telling the definitive story of Jancis Robinson's life so far, including her extraordinary career in as a wine writer. Recorded in person throughout August 2025, it features extensive interviews with Jancis as well as members of her family, some childhood friends, fellow wine luminaries and a few literary guests too. For a full, edited transcript of this episode, click here. Produced by Richard Hemming. © JancisRobinson.com 2025 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Jancis Robinson Story is a seven-episode series telling the definitive story of Jancis Robinson's life so far, including her extraordinary career in as a wine writer. Recorded in person throughout August 2025, it features extensive interviews with Jancis as well as members of her family, some childhood friends, fellow wine luminaries and a few literary guests too. For a full, edited transcript of this episode, see here. Produced by Richard Hemming. © JancisRobinson.com 2025 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Jancis Robinson Story is a seven-episode series telling the definitive story of Jancis Robinson's life so far, including her extraordinary career in as a wine writer. Recorded in person throughout August 2025, it features extensive interviews with Jancis as well as members of her family, some childhood friends, fellow wine luminaries and a few literary guests too. For a full, edited transcript of this episode, see here. Produced by Richard Hemming. © JancisRobinson.com 2025 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Jancis Robinson Story is a seven-episode series telling the definitive story of Jancis Robinson's life so far, including her extraordinary career in as a wine writer. Recorded in person throughout August 2025, it features extensive interviews with Jancis as well as members of her family, some childhood friends, fellow wine luminaries and a few literary guests too. For a full, edited transcript of this episode, see here. Produced by Richard Hemming. © JancisRobinson.com 2025 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Jancis Robinson Story is a seven-episode series telling the definitive story of Jancis Robinson's life so far, including her extraordinary career in as a wine writer. Recorded in person throughout August 2025, it features extensive interviews with Jancis as well as members of her family, some childhood friends, fellow wine luminaries and a few literary guests too. For a full, edited transcript of this episode, see here. Produced by Richard Hemming. © JancisRobinson.com 2025 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Those who follow the musical career of Maynard James Keenan, lead singer of bands such as Tool, Puscifer and A Perfect Circle, may not know that he is an accomplished winemaker in the Grand Canyon state. He planted his first vines in Arizona in 2002 and from 2009 has been making such good wine at his Caduceus winery that he has become a bit of a poster boy for Arizona wine. He tells wine writer and ex Arizona resident Elaine Chukan Brown how the late South Australian winemaker Taras Ochota inspired him to become America’s pioneer of unusual blends – a red wine grape with a white one, for instance.  Other Australian influences include using his lab equipment to analyze two of the country’s most famous classic wines which showed him that grapes don’t need to be super-ripe to make great wine. He reveals himself as a real wine geek and committed farm-to-table restauranteur – in fact there’s hardly any mention of music in this intriguing conversation with the man who has arguably done most to put Arizona on the world wine map. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Christian Seely is not a winemaker, but he runs a crack team of fine winemakers all over the world as the man in charge of the wine division of insurance company AXA. But he’s no boring executive; he really, really cares about wine and consistently produces some of the highest-rated wines in the world. Under his aegis, second growth Ch Pichon Baron in Pauillac, for instance, is making wine of Bordeaux first growth quality – partly by cutting production by about a half. His Sauternes property Ch Suduiraut is consistently a top scorer too. Seely’s first love was port and AXA’s Quinta do Noval is another stunning property whose wines now match their setting. He also has experience of wine production in fashionable Burgundy, Tokay in Hungary and, most recently, the Napa Valley. In this episode Jancis grills him about price of fine wine, what constitutes classic wine, and the notorious en primeur system of selling bordeaux before it’s even bottled. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Two women who care passionately about our changing climate, wine writer Elaine Chukan Brown and sustainability scientist Professor Kimberly Nicholas, who has a special interest in biodiversity, farming, wine and food, discuss what we as individuals can do in the face of our rapidly warming planet. They look at the bigger picture but also how climate change affects wine production and how wine lovers might play their part in reducing carbon emissions. ‘Wine is a fingerprint or a taste of climate change,’ says Nicholas, whose PhD topic was the effect of climate change on the wine industry in her native California. She identifies the three areas in which we can have greatest personal effect by modifying our behaviour and actually quantifies a wine-bottle carbon emission equivalent of a round-trip flight between London and New York. (It’s many more than you might think!) They discuss how apparently small decisions such as how wine is packaged can have a considerable effect. And Nicholas is a realist. Her book Under the Sky We Make; How to be Human in a Warming World has a cheat sheet at the end for those who’d rather use that than read the whole book. Very considerate…. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tinashe Nyamudoka, a former economic migrant from Zimbabwe, shares his extraordinary journey from working in a supermarket to becoming a respected sommelier in Cape Town. He discusses the challenges he faced and how he and three other Zimbabweans eventually formed Team Zimbabwe, competing in the World Wine Tasting Championships. Tinashe also talks about his new venture, Kumusha Wines, and his ambitions as a wine entrepreneur.