Musical Terroir Terroir is one of those in-crowd terms used to describe the subtleties of wine and, more recently, craft food and drink. Basically defined as “the conditions in which a food is grown or produced and that give the food its unique characteristics,” terroir traditionally refers to soils, water quality, climate, growing traditions and qualities detectable to discernible palates. It evokes a certain sense of place. Music isn’t generally described by these variables