PATOS

Norwegian singer and composer Sondre Lerche started PATOS natural wines at the height of the pandemic in 2020. Less than three years later he is expanding his palette further through collaborations with natural wine icon Frank Cornelissen, Northern Italian sparkling wine experts Casa Belfi, as well as new vintages of his initial trio of wines with Catalonia’s Castell d’Age.

Lerche returned to his native Norway at the beginning of the pandemic after living in New York and Los Angeles for 15 years. The abrupt and enforced change of pace proved somewhat welcome; Lerche had just released another acclaimed album, «Patience», as well as a book of essays, and was on a creative and exploratory roll. Little did he know he would soon be launching an elegant line of natural wines.

He did not sit still or withdraw. While traveling around Norway during various stages of shutdown, performing socially distanced solo shows, Lerche began composing his next album, his magnum opus «Avatars Of Love». After many inspired summer nights of drinking deep, dark rosés, Lerche had the idea to merge his passion for wine, art and music on a more extravagant and active scale. Through Norwegian natural wine distributors Non Dos, Lerche came in touch with third generation female-led bio-dynamic winemaker Castell D’age of Catalonia, Spain. Due to the pandemic, Lerche could not yet travel to the vineyards himself, and so countless bottles and blends were sent to his temporary home in Bergen during the fall of 2020. The results? A structured all-year rosé (PATOS Luz y luz); a crips, dry sparkling wine (Cuvée PATOS); and a juicy, full-bodied orange wine (PATOS Maceracion).

«I was in the midst of composing and recording what was to be my most important and intense work so far, «Avatars Of Love». I was in a state of near constant excitement and restlessness, composing, writing, making wine, running marathons…just living a very full and chaotic life. The new songs were expansive, and filled with a new sense of purpose, adventure and pathos that I had not dared to fully inhabit before. The name of my line of wines became obvious: the Norwegian word for pathos: PATOS.»

Since then «Avatars Of Love» has won worldwide acclaim, including four nominations and one win at the Norwegian equivalent of the Grammys. UKs Uncut Magazine gave it nine out of ten stars, comparing Lerche favorably to many of his most treasured musical inspirations: Tom Jobim, Paddy McAloon and Cole Porter, while Germany’s RND simply asked «Album of the year?» upon its release in April of 2022. And now the next chapter in PATOS wines begins, with art from the most exciting visual artist exploding in Norway at the moment, Nikolai Torgersen. Lerche knew he wanted to explore Italian wines, his first love. After visiting Northern Italy’s old-school prosecco-guru Maurizio Donadi of Casa Belfi, PATOS Fresco was born — a sparkling pinot noir.

Down south, in Sicily, Lerche visited natural wine maestro Frank Cornelissen, and began the process of making wine out of his friend Jørgen’s grapes harvested in Contrada Belicello, between Castelvetrano and Menfi, southwest Sicily. The vineyard and olive grove is located at the egde of the Valle delle Belice at about 200 m above sea level where the former river Belice has contributed to the formation of deep soil with a rich texture of sand, clay, limestone and calcite. The upper soil layer has a lot of pebbles and limestone. It’s taken both patience, passion and skill, but now Sondre Lerche and Frank Cornelissen are proud to present PATOS Susucaru, a light orange wine made from Cataratto Extra Lucido grapes.