Rio Fiore

Wellness Practioner

Rio (aka Jim Salerno) has dedicated his life to the odyssey of exploring what it is to be in a body, learning about the sheer wonders of movement, and sharing about the many incredible possibilities that movement and embodied practice can offer us as humans. He deeply enjoys his work as a somatic educator, teaching folks things about living well in a body; a licensed massage and bodywork therapist; a dancer; and a movement instructor.

After graduating from The Finger Lakes School of Massage in 2001, Rio began a private and still ongoing apprenticeship with Sandy Morningstar in Reichian-based body therapy and rebirthing work in northern Vermont. He then began intensive study of the John Barnes Myofascial Release method for addressing and unwinding long-held distortion patterns held in the fascial system. Soon after beginning a private body therapy practice in Philadelphia, he began studying several forms of dance (butoh, modern, contact improvisation), yoga (Iyengar, Bikram, Classical Hatha, and Kundalini), internal and martial arts (including Qi Gong), and many somatic practices (including Continuum, and various forms of breathwork). He began dancing semi-professionally in Philadelphia, and worked with Manfred Fischbeck and the Group Motion Dance Theater, as well as an improvisational performance collective guided by Fischbeck.

Since relocating to western NC in 2016, and after living for a year at Earthaven Ecovillage, Rio started a private practice in body therapy and movement arts in Asheville, NC. He has been training in MovNat, is beginning a yearlong immersion studying Tantra, and is near completion of his certification as an Advanced Myofascial Release practitioner.