Daniel Corrigan keeps his eyes on the stars.

By Mary O'Regan

Daniel Corrigan, First Avenue’s staff photographer and frequent City Pages freelancer, originally wanted to be a CIA agent. He studied Spanish and linguistics at the University of Minnesota in the early ’80s and planned to go to Nicaragua to work in cryptology. But just before graduation, with only a few credits left to fulfill, a liberal arts requirement changed his entire career.

Corrigan, 48, works in a messy seventh-floor studio in the heart of the Warehouse District. He’s tall and unassuming with streaks of grey in his dark brown hair and glasses that hang around his neck by a cord. Wearing head-to-toe black, with his arm slung across a tall metal ladder, Corrigan recalls being forced to take an art class during his senior year.

“Photography had the most practical application to being a CIA agent,” he says. The artistic awakening that followed took Corrigan by complete surprise. “I remember in the dark room, the first time seeing one of my prints come up — everything changed.”

From that moment on, Corrigan gave up his dream of South American intelligence, and launched into a new career. He spent the next four years taking every photography class that the U offered and worked his way up to chief photographer of the Arts and Entertainment section at the Minnesota Daily.

“That was kind of during the supposed heyday of Minneapolis music,” he explains. “So that’s how I kind of got involved in the music end.”

Corrigan has been freelancing steadily ever since. He’s primarily known for his concert photography, with a rooftop shot of The Replacements for their “Let It Be” album among his most famous photos.

“That picture, if it had been up to me, would’ve never been used,” he admits. “That just shows what I know.”

The local music scene is part of what keeps Corrigan rooted in Minneapolis, though he doesn’t consider himself musically inclined.

“For me, a great drummer is someone that looks good up there,” he chuckles. “I guess I understand that there’s complicated stuff and all that, but I can’t hear it.”

(Click here to listen to Corrigan discuss great guitar solos and talented drummers.)

Corrigan has befriended countless rock and roll stars throughout his quarter-century career. When asked to choose a favorite photo, he describes a Polaroid that he took of Soul Asylum’s Dave Pirner playing with a highly flammable Dutch lighter. “I did a lot of work with Soul Asylum,” he remembers. “I was good friends with all those guys. I loved their music.”

Soul Asylum, Run Westy Run and Hammerhead are some of Corrigan’s favorite local bands. He knows how lucky he is hanging out with local celebrities on a regular basis. Sometimes, when a band needs performance photos, Corrigan will stage “fake live shots,” which involve the band setting up their equipment and playing just for him. He’s enjoyed intimate performances from bands like Trip Shakespeare, the Replacements and the Brass Kings.

But being a photographer for the stars isn’t without its pitfalls.

“My ears are just wrecked from this,” Corrigan laments. He describes an AC/DC concert in 1984 in which photographers were only allowed to shoot during the second, third and forth songs. “They led us down to the photo area and it’s cordoned off right in front of the [speaker] stacks … I was the only photographer to stand there longer than 30 seconds. I stood there for like one song, you know, shooting to get my shot, but then I had to run away, too. And my ears have been ringing ever since.”

Corrigan jokes that the ringing noise is out there, but that he’s the only one who can hear it. Then he adds, “Kiddies, wear your earplugs.”

Hearing loss hasn’t kept Corrigan out of the booming rock clubs, but quieter gigs give him temporary reprieve. “I’ve done pictures of everything,” he says. Some of his stranger jobs include Weight Watchers before-and-after shots and evidentiary photography for insurance companies. He’s also done a lot of children’s pictures, which, as the father of a 2-year-old, is particularly fun for him.

“I make much better pictures when I shoot all the time, when I’m shooting a lot,” he explains. “You’re a photographer until you stop making pictures, and the second you stop making pictures you’re not a photographer anymore.”

“Dan Corrigan Music Photography: The Analog Years” opens June 7 at Mill City Museum from 6–10 p.m. It is presented in partnership with the Minnesota Center for Photography.


Contact Mary O’Regan at moregan@mnpubs.com or 436-5088.