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Fall Workshop
September 20, 2025 @ 8:15 am – 4:30 pm
ASTA-AZ Fall Workshop & Retreat 2025
Unlock Your Full Musical Potential: Join Us at ASTA Fall Workshop
Step into a day of inspiration, transformation, and hands-on discovery at the ASTA Fall workshop: a one-of-a-kind event designed for string players who want to move, feel, and perform better. Kicking off with cutting-edge insights from Lynn Medoff, PT, you’ll learn how neuromuscular retraining can revolutionize your posture, mechanics, and playing through a targeted movement program. Dr. Natalie Papini will follow with powerful techniques to support your nervous system, tackle performance anxiety, and elevate overall wellness. Then, Dr. Sarah Schreffler brings music to life through Dalcroze Eurhythmics, guiding you in joyful movement-based exploration that deepens musical expression, no experience needed, just curiosity and
energy. With coffee, connection, chamber music, and orchestra reading sessions, this full-day event is more than a workshop, it’s a reset for your mind, body, and artistry.
Come for the knowledge. Stay for the music. Leave transformed.
Location: Church of the Master, 6659 E University Dr, Mesa AZ 85205
Date: Saturday, September 20th 8:15 AM – 4:30 PM
Registration: Free for members, $20 for student non-members or current NAfME members, $50 for guests (which can be subtracted from the Annual Membership fee if the participant chooses to join).
Lunch Fee: $15 (participants are welcome to get lunch on their own if preferred), there will be an option to pay for lunch and admission at the event, provided the participant has emailed us their intent to join the lunch offer.
Sessions:
Lynn Medoff, PT, MA, MPT
The presentation will begin with a brief lecture covering:
- Concepts of neuromuscular retraining of posture and movement mechanics.
- A training program created by the presenter using these concepts.
- Application of this work to the training of string players.
Participants will be taught a movement program to improve alignment and movement
patterning. This work will then be applied to playing of the participants’ instruments.
Dr. Natalie Papini
- Workshop on wellness, nervous system help, overall health, and performance anxiety
Dr. Sarah Schreffler
- Dalcroze Eurhythmics: a joyful, hands-on approach that employs movement to explore rhythm, melody, and expression.
- In this session, we’ll jump right in with simple activities that get you moving, listening, and connecting more deeply with music from the string repertoire. You’ll experience how musical interactions and experiences can unlock new ways of understanding and bring the printed page to life. No special skills are required, just a willingness to move and explore.
Schedule
| 8:15 | Meet & greet with coffee and bagels |
| 9:00 | Dr. Lynn Medoff |
| 10:00 | Dr. Natalie Papini |
| 11:00 | Dr. Sarah Schreffler |
| 12:00 | Lunch |
| 1:00 | Annual membership meeting |
| 2:00 | Chamber music reading session with members |
| 3:00 | Orchestra reading session for all levels of students |
Clinicians
Sarah Schreffler
Sarah Schreffler has an extensive background as a recitalist, chamber musician and orchestral performer. She is the concertmaster of the Sedona Symphony, and a founding member of the Burn City String Quartet and its sibling ensemble, the violin duo Broke Fiddles. She has also performed with the AZ Musicfest Orchestra, Arizona Bach Festival, Phoenix Symphony, Tucson Symphony, Arizona Opera, Phoenix Opera, the Arizona Chamber Orchestra, and the Seattle Symphony. While studying at the Cleveland Institute of Music and Arizona State University, Sarah worked closely with members of the Cleveland, St. Lawrence, and Orion String Quartets, and members of these ensembles. She has collaborated on currently available and forthcoming orchestral and chamber music recordings, available on the Con Brio and Summit labels, and is a frequent collaborator in sessions with a variety of recording artists.
As a teacher, Sarah supports student development through examination of technique, exploration of musicality and discovery through movement, and centering the joy of making music with others. Students are encouraged to travel their musical paths with purpose and a spirit of adventure.
In addition to her performance activities, Sarah currently instructs violin and viola at Chandler-Gilbert Community College and coaches orchestra at Brophy College Preparatory. She holds performance degrees from The Cleveland Institute of Music and Arizona State University, as well as the Dalcroze Certificate from the Dalcroze School of Music and Movement, where she is currently pursuing the Dalcroze License.
Natalie Papini
Natalie Papini, PhD, is an assistant professor at Northern Arizona University, where she has
taught students stress management for the past eight years. Her research focuses on weight-
inclusive approaches to health, self-compassion, and integrative strategies for stress reduction
and behavior change. Prior to working in higher education, Dr. Papini worked in healthcare
training health coaches to support clients in making sustainable lifestyle behavior changes,
including stress management practices. She earned her PhD in Interdisciplinary Health and her
master’s degree in clinical health psychology from NAU.
Lynn Medoff
Lynn Medoff has been a practicing physical therapist since 1994. She specializes in the treatment of performing artists. Ms. Medoff has published and presented widely in the area of performing arts medicine including for the Arizona Strings Teacher Association, the Arizona and Colorado Suzuki Institutes, the Aspen Music Festival and is published in Medical Problems of Performing Artists.
Ms. Medoff is a classically trained dancer who holds an MA in dance from the University of Illinois. She has had an extensive career in training, teaching, performance and choreography. This includes the development and teaching of the Science for Dancers program at Florida State University.
Ms. Medoff integrates the art of dancing with the science of movement to develop a movement training program that maximizes movement efficiency which is especially helpful forperforming artists.