The Calling Winemaker James MacPhail on the Ripple Effect of Many Passionate People Working Together
“I’ll never forget the first day on the job, at my first job,” winemaker James MacPhail recently remembered. “I told myself, ‘This is it.’ I just loved it… I was probably scrubbing a tank or something [in] blue jeans and a T-shirt. Like, this is great.”
In the latest installment of The Wine Enthusiast podcast, sponsored by Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits, MacPhail—the winemaker of The Calling and a Wine Star Award nominee for 2024 Winemaker of the Year—talks about how winemaking became his calling. It’s a fitting story, given the name of the collection, which includes an impressive slate of handcrafted California Chardonnays, Pinot Noirs and Cabernet Sauvignons that speak of authenticity and a clear sense of place.
The Calling isn’t just a reflection of MacPhail’s life story, though. It’s also the story of co-founders Jim Nantz and Peter Deutsch. They established the winery in honor of their fathers—two figures who pushed and inspired each man to follow their dreams.
“For this brand, there’s a lot of people involved, and a lot of other people that I feel, along the line, kind of found their calling in whatever aspect that’s being contributed,” MacPhail told us. “Either it be a grower or a farmer or someone else working in the winery alongside me that’s helping me craft these wines.”
That passion has a ripple effect, MacPhail believes. “When you look at an artist or anyone who’s crafting something, you hope that they’re doing it for the love of it, that they have found their calling and that they’re putting love and energy and passion into a product,” he said. “That is hopefully, ultimately, translated to the consumer.”
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Episode Transcript
Transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting.
Speakers: Rachel Tepper Paley, James MacPhail
Rachel Tepper Paley 0:09
Hi James. Thanks so much for being here today.
James MacPhail 0:53
Thank you.
Rachel Tepper Paley 0:54
Tell me a little bit about your background. How and when did you realize that winemaking was your calling.
James MacPhail 1:03
Well, if I go back to kind of childhood days and teenage days, and I look at those days as kind of formative years in you know, the things that I did learning about agriculture or learning a musical instrument. I think that all those, all those things in my in my early years, kind of molded me into, you know, becoming a winemaker. There's certain things about life that you learn, and sometimes you know you may not be eventually working in that exact field. But you learn disciplines, and you learn skills that kind of allow you to or they kind of parlay into something else. So I was started playing classical piano at a very young age, and that discipline, you know, taught me, you know, focus and attention to detail, you know, kind of being a kind of precise mind frame. My mom's side of the family were third generation dairy farmers, and so I spent a lot of time on the dairy ranch. And I think that those that time kind of gave me the love of agriculture, and so I kind of point to those two kind of specific things in my life that kind of led me to the wine. I was always fascinated wine. I grew up with wine around the table. My father taught my sister and I about about wine and be having it be a part of the meal, very European, and I always had the half water, half wine glass on special occasions. And so, I think at an early age, I kind of joked that it got into my blood. And was always fascinated with the product. I always thought there was really, really cool that you could make such a beautiful product from the earth that gave so much people joy and brought people around a table, brought, you know, conversation, and it was part of people's lives and celebrations and everything else. So I didn't go to school for it. Originally, I had two tours of college for other degrees, but had a kind of a change in changing career in my early 20s and and threw everything in and decided to move on up to Healdsburg and learn how to make wine. Just kind of a pretty radical and pretty big decision at the time, but my family was like, you're leaving what to go do what. But, you know, it was just, it kind of felt like that was a calling, and that was kind of what I was meant to, meant to go do.
Rachel Tepper Paley 3:58
You grew up in California, right?
James MacPhail 4:02
I did, yes. I grew up in Marin County. San Rafael got it
Rachel Tepper Paley 4:05
because, uh, drinking, you know, having wine as be part of the the meal. It's very European, but it's also very Californian. I think it is.
James MacPhail 4:13
It is, yes, yeah, when you look at my family, they all are, my entire family are very big wine drinkers.
Rachel Tepper Paley 4:21
Well, years, what, um, what did those early years in winemaking look like for you?
James MacPhail 4:26
So when I kind of packed my bags and moved up to Healdsburg, I was, well, what was that 2026, and so, I mean, I was, I was naive. I was, you know, I was stepping into something that, you know, I had kind of book knowledge and, you know, my own kind of hobby knowledge of, you know, fermenting things and things like that. But I'll never forget the first, first day on the job, at my first. Job. I told myself, this is it. I just loved it. I mean, I was, I was hired for as a, you know, harvest intern. And, you know, I was probably scrubbing a tank or something, and I'm, you know, blue jeans at a t shirt like this is great. A lot more romantic and a lot more exciting than scrubbing, scrubbing a dairy tank. I don't know if there's a correlation there, but I feel like, you know, it was just a little bit more exciting. I mean, it's just because I had that in the interest in wine. But, yeah, those early days were spent at kivera Vineyards out in directwood Valley, and I was there for almost four years, and I did almost every position in that winery, except wine, except, you know, being the winemaker, very formative years in my career.
Rachel Tepper Paley 5:53
Tell me a little bit about your relationship with your family. You mentioned before they were like, you're gonna leave. Do what to do? What you you mentioned to me earlier that your father's blessing to pursue this was a big part of what finally gave you the push to do it. Can you tell me a little bit about
James MacPhail 6:09
that? Yeah. So the kind of the sad part of the story is that my my parents passed away in my early 20s, and that was kind of the impetus for for me, just realizing that life was short and to go off and do something that you love, that you're really interested in. And I grew up in a family business in Marin County that was that started in 1880 and it's so going today. And of course, there was an awaking moment in my childhood. Either it'd be after school, weekends, summers, if I wasn't on the dairy Ranch, I was working for the family business, and we were all very proud of it, and it was just that was our world. And so when I went off to college, I first tour and got a business degree, my my father never really spoke about or never gave my sister and I like the pressure to go work for the family business, but when I graduated college at that time, the business world was changing in the businesses that we were in, and so it was really no longer a family business. It was getting more competitive. And there was, you know, competitors coming in, you know, kind of the late 80s and and so I went to, I had a discussion with my father, I remember, and he kind of gave me the blessing of, you know, this is, you know, the business environment has changed. It's, much more competitive and cutthroat. And he really kind of encouraged me to go find my calling. I mean, go do, go do something that I, I was interested in, which was really, of course, a big, a big relief. I think when others that have that conversation with with their family, when they grow up in a family business or something, and then they're allowed to kind of be set free. Is a really cool feeling.
Rachel Tepper Paley 8:06
Yeah, when you told me that story, I couldn't help but think about the calling wine and its story behind its name. Can you share that about how your experience mirrors that of the calling owners, Peter Deutsch and Jim Nance,
James MacPhail 8:24
well, I think it's absolutely, I think there's a little serendipity in it that this all kind of came to be being the winemaker for the calling in that their story mimics mine. You know, it's kind of neat to be on a team where, you know, these kind of three key people all kind of found their calling, right, inspired by their fathers and everything else, because it's exactly what, what happened with me, yeah,
Rachel Tepper Paley 8:53
and each of them was sort of given permission by their fathers to pursue their
James MacPhail 9:00
Exactly, exactly. That gets a really neat it's a great connection. It's a really neat connection.
Rachel Tepper Paley 9:06
Was that one of the things that drew you to the project were there other things that brought you in? There
James MacPhail 9:12
was a lot of things that that drew me to the project. Of course, when I first heard about the calling and the story behind it, I felt that that was a pretty, pretty neat connection. I was told about the project from the previous winemaker, Dan Goldfield, who had called me up and said, hey, you know, I think that you'd be a good candidate for this project. Dan wanted to, you know, kind of spend more time on his, his brand and things slowly, kind of retire. And so it was, kind of, it was a, it was a very natural fit, because the wines that we make for the calling are all we're all kind of in my my world, you know, I knew, I knew many of the vineyards I had, you know, shared some of the vineyards. With Dan and the calling wine making was, you know, Dan and I had very kind of similar winemaking styles, and so it's a very kind of natural fit, yeah,
Rachel Tepper Paley 10:10
how would you characterize the wines and the calling? And I know it's a lot of it's a lot of wine. So big picture, is there something that you think is like a through line.
James MacPhail 10:21
I like to say that, you know the calling Yes, between the Chardonnay and the Pinot Noir and the Cabernets, and then, of course, the single vineyard tier of wines. They're all very authentic and honest wines from a specific place. And I say that specifically, just because there's, there's a lot of wines out there that are kind of losing their authenticity. I think when you when you have a little larger scale production, you lose that. But we have not. We've kept the wines very authentic, 100% variety true to kind of honest wine from a very from a, you know, some of the best appellations in California, when
Rachel Tepper Paley 11:06
you say that authentic and honest is that, like, are you talking about, like, lower intervention techniques? What?
James MacPhail 11:13
Yeah, exactly. I'm talking about winemaking that is honest, or wines that are not heavily manipulated. There are not a lot of additives used. You know, they're just, they're authentic. They're real,
Rachel Tepper Paley 11:27
yeah. And you'd also talked about how they're like, 100% varietal wines, which I think is, is a big thing too.
James MacPhail 11:35
Yes, yeah,
Rachel Tepper Paley 11:37
there's no mistake. Gang up Pinot Noir for anything other than a pin, a bar,
James MacPhail 11:41
that's correct,
Rachel Tepper Paley 11:45
and there are a bunch of different collections within the calling. There's the Platinum, there's the gold, the silver. How would you describe those and how would you recommend them to various drinkers?
James MacPhail 11:56
Yeah, you have a great kind of a great selection of wines for the consumer, you know, starting with the with the silver level, the kind of entry level appellation series wines, and for the consumer, going into the store and picking up, for example, a bottle of the Sonoma Coast Chardonnay. I feel that that wine is going to hopefully, really impress them, and it's going to over deliver in both quality, you know, quality for the price that they paid. That's really the, that's kind of the little bit of the, you know, the world that the calling is in that these wines going to over deliver for quality versus price point. I would hope that for that consumer that is, you know, gets turned on to the quality wines and are impressed, they can then explore, you know, the next tier, which is the the gold tier, with the Russian River Pinot, the dun Ranch, Chardonnay. And still, you know, great wines, great price. And then you know, capped with the single vineyard tier, with wines a fruit that comes from some of the most coveted family vineyards in California. So you've got everything. Runs the whole gamut.
Rachel Tepper Paley 13:19
That's great. That's great.
Rachel Tepper Paley 14:02
The calling’s platinum collection includes limited productions, single vineyard wines from some of sonoma's most celebrated, family owned vineyards. Can you tell me a little bit about how they speak to a place, that place being Sonoma?
James MacPhail 14:17
Yes, oh my gosh. I so I absolutely love this, the single vineyard tier, because I would put them up against any of the great wines in California. They come from such great vineyard sites that, you know, we've been very, very fortunate to be able to be in these vineyards and be a part of these great kind of no just historic and also very well known vineyards, the two Chardonnay Sullivan vineyard and Heinz Sullivan is a historic vineyard that was planted by the Dutton family. There's quite a few other producers that also do, a Sullivan single vineyard that was planted in 1982 and then, of course, Charles heights vineyard, which is probably one of the most historic Chardonnay vineyards out on the west Sonoma Coast. Very, you know, highly allocated fruit, but very fortunate, you know, to be to be to be able to be in there. And then the three Pinot wires, the fox din Terra de promisio and the patriarch, which comes from a specific vineyard out on the on the western coast as well. But again, very, you know, highly, highly respected, highly allocated vineyards, Terra to promisio. My gosh, I think there's probably about maybe seven or eight producers that do a single vineyard return as well. So in great company, but they all speak to a very specific place here in Sonoma County. And I think that when you really look at the great wines of Sonoma County, they all come from a very specific site, and they speak to that site. You know, Sonoma is one of the best places in the world to grow Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Cabernet from Alexander Valley. So it's a combination of the of our great, great soils and our climate that just make these wines same, expressive, beautiful wines.
Rachel Tepper Paley 16:26
I think sometimes the word calling is suggestive of a single person's pursuit of their passion, but I imagine that the calling is not that it's the result of many people's passions that have come together. Would you agree with that? And do any stories come to mind about the people behind the bottle?
James MacPhail 16:45
That's a great question, because yes, you're right. The calling, a calling, someone can have a, you know, an individual can have a specific calling. But I think that in order to to find your calling, I think it takes, it takes a lot of people contributing to that. I think that when people find their calling, I think there's you look back, and I think there's been a lot of support to that in many different ways. And for this brand, it takes, there's a lot of people involved, and a lot of other people that I feel along the line kind of found their calling in in whatever aspect that's being contributed, either it be a grower or a farmer or, you know, someone else working in the winery, uh, alongside me that's helping me craft these wines. There's a lot of people along the way that that love what they do and have found their calling to be a part of it.
Rachel Tepper Paley 17:47
Do any particular stories jump out at you, either from this last vintage or past vintages? Well, I
James MacPhail 17:54
think that I know that there's a lot of vineyards that we're in, a lot of the family owned vineyards where those people are having their calling. If that's that's, I think that's probably in my world, that's, you know, probably the greatest example of knowing someone, and I maybe Charles Heinz would, would come to mind. So Charlie grew up on the farm, originally, where the vineyards planted, and he inherited it from his family. But he tells a story that he, you know, he fell in love with the land and farming at an early age and knew that he that's what he wanted to do. And he's turned that vineyard into, you know, one of the most sought after, highly allocated Chardonnay vineyards in in California. Wow.
Rachel Tepper Paley 18:52
And I imagine that you know, every person who works at every single point of production, you know, like the end result the wine, the quality of that wine is dependent on every single one of those steps, like being someone's calling, you know, like someone doing the best possible job that they can do, really, you Know, an attention to detail. So even it's like, there are probably so many stories within the
James MacPhail 19:26
Yeah, there are, right? Because, I mean, think about all the people that are involved in making a bottle of wine, I think that you can't, there's, there's, there's going to be a lot of those people along the way that are also, you know, we're in this industry for a reason, and we're we're doing something that we love, and we're making something. We're crafting something we're a part of something either be a farmer, you know, growing the growing the wine grapes, loving tending his, his or her land, you know. Daily workers in the vineyard that are tending those vines all the way to the winery, you know, working alongside maybe it's kind of a younger, younger person that's, you know, pursuing their calling. May not have found it yet, but you can see, see their interest and their passion. And I get to work in a number of different wineries, and I am around a lot of, you know, interns and, you know, kind of maybe the younger generation, they're just getting into this industry. And I love seeing kind of like that spark in their eye or their interest, or they show something that's that you can kind of tell that they're working towards finding their calling. So you have all kind of, you know, varying degrees of it, you know, you have the generations that are have definitely found their calling, you know, the and then you've got the ones that are, I think, on their way to finding it. So it's a, it's a really neat industry and product to be a part of all of that, you know, from the beginning to the end, I imagine
Rachel Tepper Paley 21:09
that's, it's sort of like you're describing a ripple effect of people's passions, just sort of, you know, building upon one another. I have to imagine that that translates to the consumer.
James MacPhail 21:24
Absolutely, I think that there's no question, you know, when you look, you look at an artist or a craft, anyone who's crafting something, you hope that they're doing it for the love of it, that they have found their calling and that they're putting, they're putting that, you know, love and energy and passion into a product that is hopefully, ultimately, you know, translated to the consumer and they get to experience it.
Rachel Tepper Paley 21:54
How have drinkers reacted to this wine?
James MacPhail 21:58
From my experience, it's this brand is doing extremely well. I go back to how this wine kind of over delivers, and I think it surprises people that they can go to their store and they can find the bottle of Russian River Pinot Noir from the calling at a great price and go home and enjoy it and go, Wow, this wine is, you know, again, 100% varietal. It's, it's balanced, it's, it hits all the nerves, checks all the boxes for what, for what people love. And just drinking a an honest, fun to drink wine
Rachel Tepper Paley 22:42
and one then I think it probably has an ability that's unique to enhance the moment, because it has like, the sort of authentic and honest quality.
James MacPhail 22:54
Yeah, I like that, you know? I like that. I like that a lot, you know? I just, I like to be able to make these wines in an authentic way, that we don't have to manipulate them, and that they can they speak to people. You know, I think that that's that, from what I've been reading and hearing and experience when I travel across the country for the calling is that people love this brand and they love the wines because they're real, they're they're drinking Pinot Noir, or they're drinking Chardonnay, and the Chardonnay is not, Chardonnay is not masked by, you know, sugar or too much oak, or, you know, the Pinot Noir tastes like. Pinot Noir doesn't taste like something else. So I think that that resonates with people. People feel like the people really appreciate that. And, you know, coupled with the great the great price of these wines, the brand is doing very well.
Rachel Tepper Paley 23:54
That's wonderful. I think that's a great place to wrap up. I certainly want a glass. Thanks so much, James for nodding today.
James MacPhail 24:02
Thank you so much appreciate it.
The post The Calling Winemaker James MacPhail on the Ripple Effect of Many Passionate People Working Together appeared first on Wine Enthusiast.
