Sandra Neels, a Force in Modern Dance for 60 Years, Dies at 85

New York Times

04-07-2025

Viewed on film, dancing from more than 50 years ago tends to have a period quality, a certain quaintness. But films of the dancer and dance teacher Sandra Neels performing the revolutionary choreography of Merce Cunningham have not dated in the least.
Tall, slender, long-limbed, self-possessed, conveying an innocence bordering on unworldly, Ms. Neels appears onscreen as if she were filmed only yesterday, a lone figure commanding space with hands and feet that are exceptionally articulate.
She danced for Cunningham from 1963 to 1973, creating roles and solos that are still performed today. Later, she became a successful choreographer in her own right and a renowned teacher, and when she died recently at 85, she had been eminent in American dance for more than 60 years.
Her death was announced by Winthrop University, in Rock Hill, S.C., where she had been an associate professor of dance since 1990. The university specified no cause or place of death.
Sandra Neels was born on Sept. 21, 1939, in Las Vegas, and grew up in Portland, Ore. Her father, Frank F. Neels, was an electrician who also shone as a ballroom dancer. Her mother, Edith (Vallereux) Neels, known as Val, was a singer, an entertainer and a pianist at the Joan Mallory School of Dance in Portland, where Sandra and her sister, Sheryl, first studied tap and ballet.
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