Presentation: Barbara Fast “Pet the Lizard”

Pet the Lizard: Calming our Brain in Teaching, Performing, and Life

Biologically our brain, sometimes called the lizard brain, is hardwired to be fearful and alert. Easy to implement techniques for teachers and students to calm our brain, called “Pet the Lizard” will be shared.

AAAPTG welcomes the esteemed Barbara Fast!

Barbara Fast received the 2025 Frances Clark Center Lifetime Achievement Award with recognition celebrated at the 2025 NCKP Conference. Dr. Fast was the 2020 recipient of OU’s prestigious David Ross Boyd Professor Award for excellence in teaching, and in 2014 OU’s Regents Award for Superior Teaching.

Her lifelong interest in effective teaching eventually led Dr. Fast to researching and discussing the practical applications of sports, brain, and educational research for practicing and teaching in the private lesson and group class. She has contributed a chapter to the forthcoming The Cambridge Companion to Piano Pedagogy (Cambridge University Press). A culmination of her interest in effective practicing and learning and their integration with current and future technology, resulted in the book iPractice: Technology in the 21st Century Music Practice Room (Oxford, 2018). Frequent workshop topics by Dr. Fast include efficient practicing tips from sports and brain research, overcoming performance anxiety, the brain and learning, sight-reading, teaching ensemble music, newly published music, and historical keyboard pedagogy.

An active clinician and adjudicator, Dr. Fast has presented at Music Teachers National Conferences (MTNA), International and National College Music Society Conferences (CMS), ISME International Conferences, The Classical Music Festival Eisenstadt, Hawaii International Conferences on Arts and Humanities, NCKP National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy, EPTA International Conference, and numerous MTA state conferences. Dr. Fast’s articles and reviews have been published in Music Performance Research, American Music Teacher, The Piano Magazine, and the New School for Music Study blog. Additionally, she has performed in chamber settings in England, Russia, Japan, and India as well as presented lecture recitals and master classes throughout the United States.