Review: Silent Disco Wine Tasting at Black Elephant Vintners

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tl;dr – If you enjoy music and wine, Black Elephant Vintners is a must-stop when visiting South Africa’s Franschhoek wine region. You’ll be treated to an immersive tasting experience – a silent disco wine tasting.

One of the most unique wine-tasting experiences I’ve ever had occurred at Black Elephant Vintners in Franschhoek, South Africa. There, I had the pleasure of partaking in their silent disco wine tasting, a sampling of their wines set to a curated playlist. Let’s talk about it.

Background on Black Elephant Vintners

Photo of Black Elephant Vintners team — Black Elephant Vintners team – Souce: You Are Travel

Black Elephant Vintners is a smaller producer in the Franschhoek region of South Africa, focusing on fun, experimental, and playful wines. “Black Elephant” comes from the last names of the two founders – Kevin Swart and Raymond Ndlovu. In Swahili, Ndoluv means “Elephant,” and Swart, though not an official word in Swahili, translates to “Dark” or “Black”. Winemaker Jacques Wentzel joins them. The team takes inspiration from the worlds of art and music, and it’s ever-present in the wines they produce and at the wine farm itself.

My Tasting Experience

Rolling up to the tasting room – Source: You Are Travel

On a day-long trip to Stellenbosch and Franschhoek, Black Elephant Vintners was our second stop. Turning into the wine farm’s paved driveway, it looked for a second that the sun would poke out to brighten up the cloudy day. While that didn’t happen, there was more than enough cheer at the tasting room to make due.

Entrance to the wine farm and tasting room – Source: You Are Travel

You enter the building into the winemaking room. The tasting room, located in the back of the winemaking room, is decently sized and accented by a long table.

The tasting room at Black Elephant Vintners – Source: You Are Travel

The walls are decorated with quippy wine puns, taking liberty of the names of famous bands and musical acts—”Drink-182,” “The Cellars,” ” Red Zeppelin,” “My Winehouse,” and “Gränd Crüe,” to name a few of the gems.

The wall of musical wine puns – Source: You Are Travel

After getting seated, a list of wines to build your tasting and headphones await.

Your headphones await – Source: You Are Travel

After making our selections, we were invited to enjoy some “random play” tunes while we awaited the presentation of the first pours. Between, Mrs. Blackbeard and myself, we selected nearly all the wines available to taste.

Wines available for tasting – Source: You Are Travel

One of the wine farm’s apprentice winemakers was our host for the afternoon, and as such, we were in for a selection of his musical choices.

Gearing up for the silent disco tasting – Source: You Are Travel

For each round of pours, our host presented the bottle, shared a bit about the making of the wine (varietals and percentages, sourcing, time in oak (if any), etc.), and then offered up a musical selection to pair with the tasting, explaining why the song was selected. After that, we were left to enjoy the taste and the jams while enjoying the artwork of the tasting room.

Purple Rain, Purple Rain – Source: You Are Travel

Themes, at times, can go a bit too far and come off a bit ”extra”. That was anything but the case at Black Elephant Vintners. I found the commitment to the theme both impressive and authentic – you could feel the team’s elevation of music and artwork in its winemaking process. The authenticity does double duty, too – I could see how folks who typically find wine to be ”stuffy” and ”off-putting” might feel comfortable and at ease sipping on a glass of Black Elephant Cap Classique.

Photo of "Rumble in the Jungle" the flagship Pinotage - Source: You Are Travel — “Rumble in the Jungle” the flagship Pinotage – Source: You Are Travel

We had five rounds of tastings all set to different songs, and I’ve dropped the songs below: (apologies, as I’m not sure the name/artist for the last song listed below (which was actually the first one played during the tasting) is correct.)

A note on Tree63: Evidently, the lead singer of this band is a brother to one of the Black Elephant founders. I’m not into Christian Rock, so I had never heard of them before, but I thought this was an interesting, personal tie-in to the music-wine theme.

The wines were solid, and more than a few of them were really impressive. Black Elephant Vintners is one of the few spots in the nearby area, offering a wide array of styles, including natural, orange, skin-contact, sparkling, and conventional wines. So, if you’re looking for a place where you can enjoy both classic tastes and wines that lean toward the experimental, you’ll be happy here.

Black Elephant Vintners flagship lineup – Source: You Are Travel

Closing out the tasting, we decided to purchase a few bottles to take with us, and right on cue (they’ve got me in on the puns now), the bottles were packed up in this carrier: