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!
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Latest Homework from Gergely
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Homework for May 6-13
Nova
Rec min to practice: 15-20 per day
What to practice: Mixed up Man, If I Were a Rich Man
How to practice:
Mixed up Man- Pay attention to rhythmic pattern throughout. The main melody is played with right hand leading first, the second time either left hand leading. Practice hands separate slowly first, then hands together when ready.
If I Were a Rich Man- Pay attention to fingering in all the different scales. Chromatic scale and minor scale are new.
How parents can support practice: Listen and guide them as needed.
Maya
Rec min to practice: 5-10 min per day
What to practice: Baby Bear, Autumn Song
How to practice:
Baby Bear- practice with visual aide (CDECEDC paper) and try to eventually be able to play without it.
Autumn Song- practice transitions between right hand and left hand. Line 2 is a repetition of line 1.
How parents can support practice: Supervise, especially the difficult passage in Baby Bear. I created the visual side but the goal is that she will eventually be able to rely on looking at the music and not need it.
Saturday, May 9th
Jack
We continued building upon Imperial March and now heading into the second phrase. I introduced the black keys as the “higher ground” in comparison to the white keys. We will continue to observe if Jack is interested to dive more into xylophone playing and note reading.
Nova
We started the session with more Stick Control practise. I have attached a link to the e-book version of the book. We will spend more time on page 14, with now a bigger focus on the rolls. A good way to practise stick control is also to combine two similar lines together, eg. playing line 9 after line 1. Regarding the note reading exercise, we touched on syncopation and dotted rhythm this week. We will talk more about that next week. For Sparkle, we are onto bar 59-62. We mentioned how the phrase has its own melody, and this particular line shares a similar melody as the phrase before. Pay attention to that during practising, and we will connect some phrases together next lesson and perhaps introduce some new material.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ADGiCCfAkWJGercA3ivs8DTQwjXziGzk/view?usp=sharing
Adam
Since Adam still doesn’t have access to his drumset, instead of learning a new song, we talked about some new rhythmic concept. Today it was triplets. We used the handout Stick Control p.14 to build that concept. Adam can either focus on line 1 and 2, or simply practise the few lines I wrote on his hand out this week.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ADGiCCfAkWJGercA3ivs8DTQwjXziGzk/view?usp=sharing
Jonah
During today’s online lesson, we worked through verse 2 of the new song Super Bad. We did a shorter lesson this week so we will compensate that 10 minutes in next week’s lesson.
Efe – Feb 14th
Hi Efe! Wishing you guys a great week!
Here is this week’s material.
Em pentatonic scale
We’re almost done this scale now. Once we get to the 12th fret, you’ll have access and the ability to solo all over the guitar neck for many, many songs and pieces in the Em key.
This week’s pictures show the added 9th and 10th frets to the scale.
– Please memorize these.
The new backing track to play over: Cool blues
Chord game
I was impressed with your work on the chords over the past week, Efe. Here is the next challenge to help you work on the proper transitioning techniques.
- I’ll have the required videos uploaded to this week’s Google Drive tomorrow.
- Practice these transitions alongside the Muse Score video in this week’s Drive. — It’s geared toward making your skills in this sharp; especially regarding Boulevard of Broken Dreams.
- The other video has me describing what fingerings to use, and how to execute the transitions properly.
Acoustic Open — Until bar 12
Keep using the ideas I gave you today to help decipher (or just read, haha) the musical notation. It was a great class of you learning the methods to deciphering the musical notation. The tips to remember:
- Where is Middle C? And where is my finger in relation to it? Close? Far?…
- See what string your Left Hand finger is on. Then go over the note names (the letters) all the way up to the fret your finger is holding down. — HINT: The only notes that need one fret (that is, one semitone) to get to the next letter are B to C, and E to F.
- Be mindful of the shapes of the melodies written. If they recur, but on different notes, then they might be played in the same way. For example: Bars 5 & 6 have a very similar shape to bars 9 & 10.
- “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge”
- “FACE”
- A note on a space right beside a note on a line is just one letter over. Same goes for the opposite.
Strumming
This is the least important homework. It’s more just for fun, if you have time. Keep working on that flicking style strumming we were talking about today.
- Outsides of the nails.
- Thumb and index finger, or thumb and middle finger.
- Don’t move your arm too much. The strength is in the fingers for this, more than anything else.
I’ll soon make the decision on which song you’ll do for your recital, Efe. Smells Like Teen Spirit or Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Thank you for your patience.
See you in a week!
Efe – Feb 7th
Hello Efe and family!
Wishing you a good week! Here is this week’s material.
This week’s Google Drive folder: Feb 7th
Last week’s Google Drive folder: Jan 31st
This week’s Google Drive
— Acoustic Open — The piece I wrote for you to learn musical notation with.
- The PDF here is of this piece.
- Here are some pictures of the notes on a guitar, corresponding with the music staff.
- For the guitar, we use the treble clef. For this clef, remember the following acronyms: “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge” for the lines, and “Face” for the spaces. They go from lower to higher. — An important thing to note is that the staff is really just 7 letters repeating themselves. A to G. So whatever letter you’re playing, the next door letters are just going up or down the alphabet by one letter. Knowing what notes you’re playing in a piece of music gets easier with time. — The pictures in this Drive folder show you the frets for each note, and where on the guitar to play them.
- Try playing through the first 4 bars of it. I’ve left out the tab on purpose. — Use the pictures to help you find out exactly what to play.
- Some help: The piece ends with a C major chord. So you’ll know that this chord’s lowest note is a middle C. From here, you can navigate letter by letter to determine what the notes on the other frets (or open strings!) are.
- The goals: learn to name what letter of note you’re playing, and where to play that note on the guitar. Don’t worry about the sharps or flats for now. I’m just getting you to learn plain old letters of the alphabet. A to G, in their various octaves.
- I’m not expecting you to be a master of this by the end of the week. But I want you to start being able to name at least some of the notes by next class. For the long term: I’m aiming for you to be able to play any named note on the guitar in the treble clef (no higher or lower notes), if you were quizzed. My goal is for you to be able to ace that type of quiz by the end of this semester.
Last week’s Google Drive
— Em pentatonic scale
- We’ve almost covered 12 frets on the fretboard. The goal is for you to reach all 12. This will give you the ability to solo more freely.
- There is a picture of the next group of frets I’m adding to your knowledge of this scale.
- Keep playing powerchords with the following: pick any note from this scale on the lowest 3 strings. Then add its fifth; remember that chess-knight movement shape I told you about a while ago.
- Play around with all of the above over this backing track. Latest Backing track
— Chord game
- The video here references Buddy Holly’s “Words of Love.”
- These are chords you know. But the hard thing about them is transitioning between them all. This video is supposed to train you in exactly that.
- The biggest help for this: Finger 1 never leaves the string. It shifts, but it never “jumps.” Unlike your other fingers; they all have to jump somewhere in order to hold down the next chord.
- Make sure to play the A chord with the fingering I showed you today. — All 3 chords in this video have their respective charts here, with the correct fingerings. Please make sure to get these fingerings right.
Lastly
— Please find your guitar pick. You’ll need it for the upcoming classes. I’d also prefer you to play the things in this week’s homework with a pick.
- If you can’t find your pick then please get some new ones.
- Get several. It’s a worthy investment.
— Listen to “Boulevard of Broken Dreams.” Official audio
- At least once. More is good because you’ll have it in your head more, and therefore you’ll know how it’s supposed to sound.
- Familiarize yourself with how it sounds. Especially the parts you didn’t know recognize from it today.
Remember, a lot of this is easier than it looks and sounds. Learning music, like with many things in life, is about “getting used to it.” So just keep spending time with it.
I look forward to seeing how you do for all of the above, Efe. You’ve improved significantly over these past 5 months. I’m excited to see even more progress from you :) I’ll see you in a week!
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
