Here’s what winemaker Gianpaolo Paglia (below) had to say about my post on his decision not to age his wines in barriques anymore.
Thank you very much Jeremy for translating part of Ziliani’s post on my decision. I’m very glad to see that this has stirred an interesting conversation on Italian blogs about the current state of the art of Italian wines and their future. I think that we are now in the position to devote our efforts to a better knowledge of our land, our vineyards, our techniques of production, or in other words, our terroir. For the last decade I’ve been on a learning curve, of which barriques and a certain style of wine were part, now I feel I have to move further to find the true expression of my land in my wines.
It’s going to take time, because nothing is fast when it comes to agriculture, but I’m sure I’m on the right path. How do I know it? Simply because I started to love my wines again.
Do Bianchi 
Yes- I know many Italian wine makers that do not love their wine or drink them. Another small step “back” in the right direction -way from the dark side
Amen! It takes guts to go this way… but people like me is with you. Bravo Gianpaolo!
I spoke to many collegues wine producers, the most honest of them admitted that there is a time in your professional life where you seem to have lost the right path, where you are still working seriously to make good wines, but things don’t seem to come together. And you start not to love the wines that you are making. Those are probably the most important moments in a wine maker’s life, because, provided that you have the honesty or yes, the guts, to listen to that inner voice and to take the appropriate decision, they can prompt a new start. Evolution is not a straight line, is a sinusoid.