Slippery Fish

The piece had a sort of abiding oddness about it, completely original in all respects.

Caroline Palmer, Minnesota Star Tribune, “Collaborations rich with mystery,” September 30, 2012

…in my favorite moment, the dancer Corbin, his eyes closed, joined in a flight of percussion that began with his feet and pattered up his body to a soft hollow grasp in air. Garbed in tailored trunks, tanks, and a spangled swim cap for Freeh (the whole, the creation of Tulle & Dye, reminiscent of a 1920s bathing costume), the dancers seemed not quite conscious of the musicians, who moved around them, watching them, calling to them with Hagen’s music—soulful plucks, sighings, and a shivery groan-singing, never quite words.

I read them as past and present: the present inchoate, longing to speak to the past, which remains strictly etched, strange, sometimes wrenched (in Freeh’s angular steps). 

Lightsey Darst, MN Artists, ‘Here & After’ and ’Slippery Fish’: the week in local dance

In Slippery Fish Freeh and Corbin interact with violinist Sam Bergman and vocalist Carrie Henneman Shaw. Corbin rocks back and forth as Bergman, seated on a knocked-over chair, bows plaintive chords. Dressed in stylish black shorts, white pleated tops, and beaded cloche hats by Tulle and Dye that suggest 1920s bathing costumes and stylish flapper wear, Freeh and Corbin sashay around, echoing the music’s witty fragmentation. They mirror and trace one another, each one entering into the spaces created by the other. 

The relationship is formal and abstract rather than intimate, the shapes they make a kind of fluid plastique that references Art Deco, Delsarte, and Dadaism. At one point Corbin’s tap dancing and body-slapping connect with Shaw’s fractured scales as Freeh swans around in odd coordinations—a cubist rendering of vamping? Finally the two dancers morph through a series of poses, a lovely collusion of Delsartian gestures. Their isolated emotions and stop-frame action make for a fetching collage of it-girls, strong men, and bathing beauties. The period references are more than pleasantly nostalgic—they’re charged with a freshness of discovery and play.

Linda Shapiro, Dance Magazine, “Slippery Fish and Other Offerings of New Music and Dance” October 3, 2012