Michael Jackson passed away in his London home last month.The world of craft beer mourns and celebrates its single greatest advocate.
His beer tasting sessions were always insightfully illuminating
and thoroughly entertaining. With his impressive knowledge of
the complete universe of beer, he was a masterful orator,
frequently digressing with countless anecdotes but always somehow
getting back to expertly showcasing the wonderful beers.
He often promoted the sense of place.
He would tell us about the place where the beer was brewed:
the actual room, the building, the town, the region, the country.
He regaled his appreciative audiences with stories about the people who made the beer, about the complex history behind the different styles of beers.
There were also some pretty good stories about the master storyteller himself. My single favorite one was relayed by fellow BURPer Tim Artz. He first posted it on our local beer discussion group and it was then reprinted in this months' BURP (Brewers United for Real Potables) newsletter. Here it is, shamefuly without any express permission of any kind:
"Many years ago when the AHA Conference was in Manchester, NH, I found myself in the hotel elevator with Michael Jackson. He inserted a key card to go to the penthouse level of the hotel and mentioned that it was nice to have such things paid for by the Discovery Channel folks.
I asked him about some of the unusual homebrews he had tried during the week. He mentioned that he really expected in New England to see more homebrews made with maple syrup, and he wanted to try some maple syrup beers. I replied that I had some Maple Syrup Old Ale in my room, and I would fetch a bottle and meet him back in the ballroom. I tracked him down with my bottle, and his eyes widened when he tasted the beer. He commented on the sherry notes and then was swamped by others getting him to try their brews. Several times throughout the evening, I would turn around, and there he was with glass extended looking for another sip.
The Manchester conference hotel did not permit us to have hospitality suites, parties in rooms, or even consume alcohol outside of the ballroom. Each evening was a ritual of shuttling beer from rooms to the ballroom. One night, my future wife and I ended up staying up til sunrise with the Chicago Beer Society guys, Kinney Baughmann, and Greg Noonan. When I finally went to turn in, two young women in hot pants, hip boots, and halter tops jumped in my elevator to go up. They produced a key card for the penthouse suite, and rode up. I thought, "Hmm....Discovery Channel account." The next day, we barely made it out of bed for the luncheon where Michael Jackson was the keynote speaker. I nearly fell off my chair when his first words were, "Just a few hours ago, I learned that lust is much better than love!"
