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!
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Efe – October 25th
Hi Efe and family! Wishing you guys a great week!
Ode to Joy was looking quite good today. I’m very happy with where we are for this piece.
Below are the following items of homework for Efe this week: an exercise and a piece aimed at the improvement of the techniques we’ve been working on lately. There’s also a game I’ve given Efe to play.
Outside picking on the circled areas of Ode to Joy.
- 20 minutes a day.
- 68bpm.
- Work on these most of all. They’re the hardest things to work on this week.
- Spend time working on these circled areas alone in one day, if that’s all you have time for.
- It’s important that we isolate these hard parts of a piece first. Without doing so, the following problem will take place: when playing an entire piece from beginning to end, the same mistakes are made over and over. Whether the mistakes are technical or in the sound of the music. Hence, we must work on the hard parts first so that they are sounding clean. Then after this, we can connect all the parts into a seamless piece of music.
Ode to Joy — the whole piece.
- 15 minutes a day.
- 68bpm.
- Like I said: only do this part once the hard parts are not so hard anymore.
Strumming game.
- 10 minutes a day.
Play any chord you know well with the strumming pattern in the following picture. Do each tempo I have given. Then play it at whatever tempo you want. It should feel fun. This is a game to play and to try out different tempos in. It’s also a great chance to experiment with how to strum chords. (Since your guitar is a steel-stringed acoustic, Efe, you can strike the strings fairly hard. Not too hard, of course, because you don’t want to damage your guitar.)
- 75bpm.
- 68bpm.
- A tempo of your choosing.
- I’ve changed the strumming pattern slightly.
— This is the amount of strumming that happens in 2 separate bars. That black line in the middle represents the separation of the bars. The dots at the top represent the 4 quarter notes that fit within each bar.
— I’ve circled the Downward arrows so as to emphasize that these are the strums that are supposed to sound louder. They should feel “stronger” than the upward arrows.
Lastly:
- Every 5 minutes during practice, check to see how the left hand is looking. Make sure it is as straight as possible while playing. Feel free to manipulate the guitar’s position relative to your body in order to achieve a straighter wrist.
- Use a metronome for all the parts that I’ve added a specific tempo.
- These times are just what I would ask to be done within a day ideally. I know it’s not always possible, so just do what you can everyday. For example, the 30 minutes on 3 or more days this past week was effective. Good work on that.
Keep up the good work, Efe. I’ll see you in a week!
Assignments from October 25th
Hello Everyone!
We saw some good progress this week, thank you!
Vida:
Today we reviewed Rocky Mountain Train! Play with the metronome this week, you can set it to various tempos (especially slow tempos) to help promote a consistent tempo between all phrases in the song. To help Vida practice you can also try walking to the beat like we did in class. Again, set the metronome to difference speeds to help Vida feel the difference between a quick and slow tempo. Encourage her to count out loud when walking to ensure her feet line up with the macro beat; her steps should line up with the numbers as she counts. Resist the urge to step on “and”. Finally, continue to play with the cards in order to build chords. We will be adding onto the Ed Sheeran song next week, the first two chords of this song are C Major and G Major in first inversion. Remind Vida that when she is practicing transitioning between these two chords that she only needs to change 2 notes as one note is common between both chords. You can play with chord progressions and inversions this way with the cards as well. Ask Vida to build a chord, then give her another chord with a common note between the two and see how she navigates between the two. You can write these down and we can talk about them next week.
Berke:
Today we started playing Ecossaise hands together! When practicing at home this week, Berke should review both the right and left hands separately and then very slowly play the two lines together. Please help Berke by reminding him that the B flat in his left hand lines up with the eighth notes in his right hand. This alignment should help anchor Berke while he navigates the song hands together. Please note; the goal for this week is not to play the song from start to finish perfectly with both hands, instead concentrate on how both hands fit together. Berke can also review Moonlight Sonata. When practicing this song, start from bar 7. Resist the urge to play the whole song from the top. Instead, use the sheet with the labelled staff to read the notes in all 3 lines (one by one) to see if you can put this phrase together without relying on muscle memory and your ear. Bring the sheet back next week as we will correct the fill in the blank section together.
Thank you Everyone!
And Happy Halloween! I’ll see you all in November!
Preferred Books for Gergely’s Students
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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
