Daniel Nagrin, a choreographer, performer, teacher and writer who was known for intensely dramatic solos that became modern-dance classics, died on Dec. 29 in Tempe, Ariz. He was 91.

Born in New York City, Mr. Nagrin made his professional debut with the company of Anna Sokolow, followed by work with Sue Ramos, who introduced him to jazz dance. Soon after, he began to perform with the modern-dance choreographer Helen Tamiris.

Mr. Nagrin appeared in several Broadway musicals including “Annie Get Your Gun,” as a chief Indian. He received the 1955 Donaldson Award for his dancing in Tamiris’s “Plain and Fancy.” He and Tamiris founded the Tamiris-Nagrin Dance Company, which performed from 1960 to 1965.

In 1970 he formed the Workgroup, an influential improvisational training and performance ensemble.

In addition to extensive performing in the United States, Europe and the Pacific through 1984, Mr. Nagrin taught around the world at colleges and festivals, including the American Dance Festival and Arizona State University in Tempe, where he was a professor of dance from 1982 to 1992. In 1993 he received a fellowship awarded to master teachers and mentors by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Mr. Nagrin wrote four books on choreography, acting for dancers and improvisation, including “How to Dance Forever: Surviving Against the Odds.” He was honored in 2007 in France in a yearlong festival called Dances of Resistance, and he continued to teach until last January.

Source: New York Times obit