Exactly (or almost) 60 years ago, on July 7, 1965, the Ais, Italian Sommelier Association, was founded in Milan. We must never forget, recalls Daniele Cernilli, the contribution of Ais education to the growth of the wine sector.
On July 7, 1965, in Milan, Jean Valenti with some friends, Professor Gianfranco Botti, Leonardo Guerra and Ernesto Rossi founded theItalian Sommelier Association. So these days Ais, or as I call it “Mama Ais,” turned 60 years old.
I have known and attended it since 1979, so “my” Ais was just fourteen years old, The president was Franco Colombani, restaurateur, owner of the Locanda Il Sole in Maleo, near Casalpusterlengo, now in the province of Lodi, then Milan. The secretary was Franco Tommaso Marchi, a volcanic character, who contributed in no small part to the establishment of the Association in those years.
My trustee, that is, the person in charge of the Lazio section, to which I belonged, was Severino Severini, a restaurateur from the Marche region but with the restaurant in Rome, on Piazza Zama in the Appio Latino district. First to win a Michelin star outside the Aurelian Walls.
Then there were characters who would become legendary, starting with Giorgio Pinchiorri who is fortunately still there, and many who have ended their human journey in the past years. Dino Boscarato of the Amelia in Mestre, Beppe Monchiero of the Daniel’s in Alba, Teodoro Bugari wine shop owner in the Marche, Piero Costantini in Rome, Beppe Biggica at the Berti in Milan, and always in Milan Antonio Piccinardi.
My teacher, the one who literally taught me how to uncork a bottle with the professional corkscrew, was Angelo Bruschi, badge number 12, who had moved from his native Lombardy to Rome to work at the restaurant of the Hotel Massimo D’Azeglio, near Termini Station, which still exists.
So many memories, so many friends that come back to me going through that whole affair. Pippo Deidda, Dino Casini, Pino Sola, Walter Filipputti, Virgilio Pronzati, Fabrizio Pedrolli, Eddy Furlan, Angelo Ingrao, Giuseppe Vaccarini, Piero Sattanino, Lucio Pompili, pieces of Ais and Italian wine history over the last half century.
All old friends and somehow fellow adventurers in those years and even afterwards. I forget a lot of them, I know, but I’m quoting off-handedly and the memories overlap and fog up a bit. It must be the age.
To say remains the fact that Ais has been a great school, of wine, certainly, but also for involving people from different professional backgrounds. Sommeliers, of course, but also producers, oenologists, journalists, enthusiasts, cooks, sales representatives, restaurateurs and wine merchants. All together very often overwhelmed by an irrepressible passion that the courses, the didactics of the Ais have helped to make it more steadfast and knowledgeable.
In sixty years there must have been more than a million people who have taken at least one tasting course. Thousands the lecturers who have taken the class. So, and in conclusion, let’s best wishes on the birthday of theAis and to its president Sandro Camilli. And we say, all together, that without it, from Mamma Ais, the history of Italian wine would have been different and certainly not better.
In the opening photo: the founders of Ais in 1965.
