M.Mus (U of T)
B.Mus (Oberlin)
Guitarist Gergely Szabo has an Advanced Diploma in Music Performance from Cambrian College where he majored in the classical guitar. Over his time there, he completed 2 years of comprehensive pedagogy courses. He also gained well grounded vocal skills, as well as basic knowledge on the piano. Outside of classical music, he exhibits a repertoire of skills and knowledge in playing the genres of rock, blues, and heavy metal music. He has experience in teaching the guitar and the ukulele to a range of people aged 6 to 54.
Gergely’s teaching methods include both the use of books and digital methods. The three main books he uses to teach guitar are as follows: “Guitar Method Book 1 by Will Schmid and Greg Koch,” “Four Star Sight Reading and Ear Tests RCM Level 1,” and “Classical Guitar Repertoire and Etudes RCM Level 1.” For teaching ukulele, he uses the book “Ukulele Songs for 1, 2, or 3 players by Elizabeth Ragsdale.” Aside from these, he frequently uses the Muse Score application as a play-along practicing tool.
Gergely’s passion for music and his dedication to growing the love of music in others are the biggest reasons why he teaches guitar and ukulele. His approach to teaching involves learning through play. The material he covers with his students is always delivered in a way that is highly interactive. Most of the assigned exercises he gives involve the elements of play that students can enjoy both in class and as homework.
Get to know Gergely…Beyond the Bio!
Coming soon!
Hobbies:
Musical influences:
Favourite food:
Least favourite food:
Favourite music:
Favourite album:
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Latest Homework from Gergely
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Tuesday, January 28th
Lila
Warmups:
–8 on a Hand
–Single strokes
–Double strokes
–Paradiddles
Review of grip: good. Keep skin contact with stick
Basic Beat Level 2**
Step 1) Count “1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + ”
Step 2) Play the Hihat with your Right Hand (RH) on all the counts
Step 3) Add in the Bass Drum with your Right Foot (RF) on “1” and “3”
Step 4) Add in the Snare Drum with your Left Hand (LH) on “2” and “4”
Visual Drumset Method: exercises 1-4**
–You can find this in the google drive>Frequently Used Resources (please bookmark for future use)
–Aim for four repetitions of each exercise without hiccups or hesitations
Josh
Warm-ups:
–Hand and foot coordination: playing steady beats on the bass drum, play singles, doubles, and paradiddles with your hands on the snare drum. There should be two snare notes (ti-ti; eighth notes) to every bass drum note (ta; quarter notes)
Groove Essentials Play-alongs
–Rock groove 4 (track 7)
White Stripes: Seven Nation Army
–Polish thsi off this week!
Myles
==Xylophone==
Warmups (***F Major):
–Scale, one octave, ascending and descending, saying the note names as you play them (F-G-A-Bb-C-D-E-f)
–Arpeggio (F-A-C-f-C-A-F)
–Broken thirds (F-A G-Bb A-C…), ascending and descending
Cirone Book: “Step Six” ex. 5-8
Eartraining: identifying thirds and fifths
Finn
Warmups (30sec each, counting aloud):
–Single Strokes
–Double Strokes
–8 on a hand
Joan Jett: I Love Rock and Roll
–begins with “watermelon watermelon” on the snare
–Play the main beat (1+2 3+4)
Fruit Salad game
–Four fruits: pear, apple, blueberry, watermelon
–Each fruit has a rhythm. Experiment mixing up to four fruits together to create your own rhythms!
Visual Drummer: p16 ex. 7-12
–Try to play these without any extra bass drum notes!
Nickelback: How You Remind Me
–Use Visual Drummer ex. 2 as the main beat for this song
–This week, play along with the recording and try to memorize where the drums come in
Francisco
Warmups:
–Stick Control first page ex. 14-18 (4x each, **120bpm goal tempo)
Tommy Igoe Groove Essentials book: Groove 1 FAST **
–Drill these beats to get them up to speed
–Be relaxed, and remember to use smaller motions to help you play fast notes
–Don’t allow your whole arm to be a part of the stroke. Instead, use your wrist to execute the fast hihat passage.
–Please speak to your father about buying this book – it is something that we can use a lot in your lessons and for years to come.
Noah
Warmups (1min each per practice session):
–Paradiddle combo exercise with bass drum on quarter notes
Paul Simon: Late in the Evening
–Use a metronome (I use the Tempo app by Frozen Ape) to help you lock the sixteenth-note Mozambique pattern into the grid
–This week, we learned the fill before Verse 1. Similarly, this needs to lock in. But, because of all the space, it’s hard to do. So, make sure to drill it slowly, counting along.
[IMPORTANT] Feb. 1 We are moving to a new system!
Hello Everybody,
Over the next week we are moving to our new booking system, Opus1.io. If you are already enrolled in Opus, please disregard this.
There is a list of important things we need to ask you to do to complete this transition.
1. Accept the proposal in your email
You’ll soon get an email ‘proposal’ from Opus1.io that is for your existing time. You will need to accept this and confirm your booking, and make your payment.
Your payment will be stopped in the old system as soon as that is sent to you.
Your proposal will be valid and your spot held until February 1st.
2. Set your payment method – Help Keep Costs Low
When setting your payment, we ask you to please consider using the ‘bank’ option rather than the credit card option. This is much cheaper for us, and with inflation and cost of living being what they are, this will help us minimize the chance of a tuition increase in the near future, by saving us thousands of dollars a year.
3. Verify your family’s account details.
We have moved over your details, but there is a chance the details are not completely accurate, or that you are not connected to your child’s account. Please review these details and make sure they are up to date and accurate.
Music Together Oopsie
When we sent out the first batch of ‘proposals’ there was an error in the monthly billing, which should be $97.64. We have sent out a second round of proposals with this corrected, so please be sure to use that one. If you already processed it at the incorrect amount, please just call or text the office at 416-651-7529 and we’ll correct that on our end for you. Sorry for any inconvenience.
Other Opus Updates and General ABC News
WHY ARE WE MOVING SYSTEMS?
Moving systems is a pain, and involves a lot of work and time. It isn’t ideal to do it. Still, we’ve had increasing problems with our current systems, and while we have managed to deal with them for quite a long time, a few factors have made this necessary. Among them: Expense, billing problems affecting families, poor response to our needs as their customers.
LESSONS WILL BE EXACT BILLING PER-MONTH
At the moment, we bill our lessons based on the monthly average for total lessons in the school year. This has been meant to bring predictability to your budget process, especially in months like January, where you might sometimes end up with 5 lessons in a month. Opus1 is not capable of that.
What this means is that lessons will now be billed for the exact amount in each month. If there are holidays you might have 3 lessons billed. If you are on a day in a month that has 31 days, you may have 5 lessons billed. We hope this does not cause too great an inconvenience.
TEXT MESSAGING MOVING TO 416-651-7529
Yes – that is correct! Starting February now you will be able to send your text messages directly to our land line phone number, which simplifies our points of connection.
MAKE-UPS WILL NOW BE SELF-ADMINISTERED*
When you have to cancel, you will be able to set your own make-up lesson within a 60 day window as long as you cancel the minimum 24h in advance. You will be able to choose an additional time with your teacher, or another teacher who can teach you the same lessons.
Your make-up credits have been transferred from our clunky spreadsheet into Opus. Note that they are set to a 90-day expiry (April 30th). Please see if you can use them sooner rather than later. With this more flexible system you should be able to have access to more make-ups, but it will be in testing for the rest of this year, and we do not guarantee that will continue next year.
*Music Together classes will still be administered on an as-needed basis if a full class is cancelled, and we’ll inform you of that when it happens.
SCHOOL YEAR RE-REGISTRATION WILL BE SIMPLIFIED
Like the onboarding process above, we’ll be able to and will send you ‘proposals’ for the school year when we enter the re-registration period, which will prebook your school year and allow you to – very quickly – confirm your lessons times. This will greatly reduce the time spent on the phone and checking off lists manually.
More information will be sent out as it becomes available. Stay tuned, and thanks for your quick action on moving to the new system!
-the ABC Team
Preferred Books for Gergely’s Students
Click to buy them here, and they’ll come right to your house! What could be easier?
Hal Leonard Guitar Method
The second edition of this world-famous method by Will Schmid and Greg Koch is preferred by teachers because it makes them more effective while making their job easier. Students enjoy its easy-to-follow format that gives them a solid music education while letting them play songs right away. Book 1 provides beginning instruction including tuning, 1st position melody playing, C, G, G7, D7, and Em chords, rhythms through eighth notes, solos and ensembles and strumming.
Four Star Sight Reading and Ear Tests
