I've played the guitar for 10+ years now, but never really took any lessons. I started watching these to learn/relearn the basics and realized i've been doing many of these things without even knowing it. Over the years my fingers somehow naturally learned to move a bit and mute unnecessary strings.
Muting the strings below the string your playing is easy. Muting one string above the string your playing is easy. But multiple above the string your playing? That funky stuff. That's kinda hard. At least I think so lol.
Been watching your videos a lot lately. I’ve been playing since 13 years old and am 33 now. I never took lessons. My step-father is an amazing guitarist and tried to teach me, but as soon as I learned Am, E, Em and D, plus a rough idea of tabs and how to form a power cord, I quit asking for help. Wish I hadn’t. Anyway, I’ve recently gotten back into playing. I’ve always been mediocre and was able to get back to my base level within a few weeks. Now I wanna get better. Ran through a ton of scales now and practice daily. Taking all your advice and rewatching your videos several times each. I feel like in a few short weeks I was able to progress as a player and expand past that wall I was sitting on for 20 years. Long “bla bla bla” message all to simply say Thank You my friend! I’ll be lurking around.
I've been playing 20 years and always thought I was decent, but always just played at my desk, unplugged on an electric, just having fun waiting for work tasks and stuff. Finally got an amp after all these years and realized I am absolutely TERRIBLE!!! I suck so much, it just sounds like slop no matter what I do. I am just now trying to learn string muting with the techniques you show in this video and it's like a newborn playing for the first time again. I am so slow, and still can't do it. I thought I could play scales fast, but they are so sloppy and noisy from unmuted strings that I realize now I can't play fast at all! I can't even play slow! I can't play AT ALL. I have so much re-learning to do, I almost feel like giving up. After an hour of practicing, I am finally starting to get to the point where I can mute the strings SOMETIMES, like 10% of the time, the other 90% of the time it either has a partially muted string buzz or it just fully rings out where I don't want it to. That's with me playing not even "slow", not even at a tempo at all, just sitting there trying to play one note and get it to be properly muted on the other strings. UGH. Guitar is so much harder than I thought when you actually care about it sounding good.
Wow all these comments are encouraging to keep going. I thought I was the only one that felt like this after getting back to guitar in so many years. Let’s touch base in 3 months 💪 we got this Thanks Justin!
Great video! What I am struggling with now is with muting strings in fingerstyle. If were able to do a tutorial playing some basic tunes with muting methods for the strings in between those you are playing I would find it incredibly helpful 🙂
Thank you so much! I found multiple lessons about this but they did not tell me what part of my right hand should be resting on the strings, this really helped me out! I've been practicing this whilst playing solos that I already know!
Thank you! Your words really hit home with me tonight. I’m trying to play Surf style music, which is really clean. I can hear the strings ringing as I lift off each string, and it doesn’t sound good. Thanks for your helpful lesson and mostly for your words, saying that this will take a while and not to get too obsessed with it. I was! 😥 Thanks again and best wishes to you!
I've played bass for years and years. Muting 4 or 5 strings when you're fingering is super easy. When it comes to using a pick, that's really lost me. I though it was wrong to touch other strings with my right hand, but I get it now
Will the techniques shown in this video work for strumming all 6 stings while wanting only 1 note to ring out? For example; how John Frusciante of the Chili Peppers plays "Can't Stop", and how a lot of funk guitar is played in general. Admittedly I care more about that kind of technique than getting rid of excess noise while playing scales.
Muting 5 while playing notes on 1 is a tricky technique and you need to be very conscious of the role each finger does / can play in helping with the muting. Thumb over to mute helps too. Be patient with this, it will take time. Cheers 😊 | Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide & Approved Teacher www.justinguitar.com
That was brilliant! Thank you! I was wondering why I wasn't able to mute ...and I wash pushing down super hard with my "free" finger - I like how you explained to use all the fingers, and include the strumming hand. And I love the suggestion to do this with scales - that will be a perfect time to practice this. But it's sort of like a finger choreography we have to work out, isn't it?
Thabk you for this! I was googling all over to see whats the best way for the picking hand to be. I want to learn it the right way! Thank youuuu Justin
One of my problems is when I lift my finger off the frets there's an unintentional open strong noise. I can even lightly apply pressure to the fret and remover my finger and an open string noise is still there. Any tips on how to mute this sound?
If changing chords / playing a song the noise will simply blend in. Don't sweat it too much just now. Cheers 😊 | close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide & Moderator [ www.justinguitar.com/ ]
I have problem with something I would call accidental pull off. when I change chords for example from d to g when I lift of 1st and second finger open G rings out I tried to do it slower but string kind of stick to my finger any advice to that ?
Hey Justin, I can definitely hear the difference the muting makes when you play, but I'm having a hard time understanding why it's necessary. I feel like if you are picking each string neatly you shouldn't need to do this, right? Or is this so that we don't have to worry about only picking one string and can be more careless? In any case, we would only need to mute the strings directly around the string we want to play, right? Feel like I'm missing something
Regarding muting with my strumming hand I always do it instinctively with the side of my hand, unlike your technique that involves the heel of your hand . would you say that's bad technique?
Its the most anoying thing for me while im playing,it actually puts me off playing sometimes,i think this is something that comes with time tho rather than trying too practice doing it
Hey Justin I watched your older video on this ruclips.net/video/oe8J-rcYf0c/видео.html and there you recommend LH muting with your 1st finger rathter than flattening the fretting finger (that's a tongue twister). I wanted to ask which is more preferable, or if there is a situation where one is more preferable than the other.
@@justinguitar This has opened some ideas to me. It seems that playing guitar is more about 'mute all the strings that you don't play' rather than 'play these strings'. And these concepts seem to apply to everything, strumming, scales, shredding. Am I wrong? I guess there are some exceptions like in the D chord where you can't mute both E&A and strum.
I've never had difficulties to mute strings, it came easily for me. But 3 months ago i bought a jazz guitar, and now i'm unable to mute E and A string and i can't get ride of this defect :(
I recall a video in which Justin shows you how to anchor your picking hand for picking accuracy. Unfortunately I've not been able to find it again... anybody know the video I mean?
I’m really focused on growing a Wes Montgomery picking style using only my thumb, but the get the tone I want I have to angle my wrist a certain way that I can’t mute the ringing string with my palm... how can I fix this? Cause I would rather not use a dampener on the neck
I'm finding the string muting thing to be miserably difficult. Is the palm muting thing even possible if you don't use a pick? Do I actually have to use a pick? That sucks, if that's the case.
No you don't but it is harder indeed. Muting is harder than it looks and it takes time to get a passable result. Additional video on muting: www.justinguitar.com/guitar-lessons/string-muting-techniques-im-134 | LievenDV | JustinGuitar Official Guide
Don't get hung up about it, it's far better to play guitar with a bit of string noise than not play guitar at all, keep learning and playing the songs you like and eventually (because you're aware of the string noise) your fingers will automatically mute them. Took over a year for it to work for me and when it did, I didn't even realise. Above all... Enjoy the guitar.
Hey, 3 years later, did you ever get your sting muting figured out? So many of the styles I want to play, such as funk and rock, make heavy use of muting and I want to guage how long it will be until I can mute strings consistently.
You want to hear the note clearly without others ringing on. Cheers 😊 | close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide [ www.justinguitar.com/ ] & Moderator on JustinGuitar Forum
I've got those hands. It takes lengthy, but medium sized hands and fingers to mute strings. It also depends how you place on the fret board and how you pick the strings with the other hand. Basically, it isn't really hard for me. There are times I've failed to mute unwanted strings but It just takes learning
![Seungmin "그렇게, 천천히, 우리(As we are)" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kAzmhLHePqU/mqdefault.jpg)
I've played the guitar for 10+ years now, but never really took any lessons. I started watching these to learn/relearn the basics and realized i've been doing many of these things without even knowing it. Over the years my fingers somehow naturally learned to move a bit and mute unnecessary strings.
human are weird
Same. I would mute the strings with my right thumb's base and palm - my picking hand.
Same here. Now I'm playing stuff where the muting is more unintuitive so I have to focus on it more so I'm making sure I'm doing it right lol
Muting the strings below the string your playing is easy. Muting one string above the string your playing is easy. But multiple above the string your playing? That funky stuff. That's kinda hard. At least I think so lol.
Been watching your videos a lot lately. I’ve been playing since 13 years old and am 33 now. I never took lessons. My step-father is an amazing guitarist and tried to teach me, but as soon as I learned Am, E, Em and D, plus a rough idea of tabs and how to form a power cord, I quit asking for help.
Wish I hadn’t.
Anyway, I’ve recently gotten back into playing. I’ve always been mediocre and was able to get back to my base level within a few weeks. Now I wanna get better.
Ran through a ton of scales now and practice daily. Taking all your advice and rewatching your videos several times each.
I feel like in a few short weeks I was able to progress as a player and expand past that wall I was sitting on for 20 years.
Long “bla bla bla” message all to simply say Thank You my friend! I’ll be lurking around.
I've been playing 20 years and always thought I was decent, but always just played at my desk, unplugged on an electric, just having fun waiting for work tasks and stuff. Finally got an amp after all these years and realized I am absolutely TERRIBLE!!! I suck so much, it just sounds like slop no matter what I do. I am just now trying to learn string muting with the techniques you show in this video and it's like a newborn playing for the first time again. I am so slow, and still can't do it. I thought I could play scales fast, but they are so sloppy and noisy from unmuted strings that I realize now I can't play fast at all! I can't even play slow! I can't play AT ALL. I have so much re-learning to do, I almost feel like giving up. After an hour of practicing, I am finally starting to get to the point where I can mute the strings SOMETIMES, like 10% of the time, the other 90% of the time it either has a partially muted string buzz or it just fully rings out where I don't want it to. That's with me playing not even "slow", not even at a tempo at all, just sitting there trying to play one note and get it to be properly muted on the other strings. UGH. Guitar is so much harder than I thought when you actually care about it sounding good.
I suffered from this
I've been working on it for quite sometime now
I'm getting better at it
Thank you Justin❤️
Wow all these comments are encouraging to keep going. I thought I was the only one that felt like this after getting back to guitar in so many years. Let’s touch base in 3 months 💪 we got this
Thanks Justin!
Thank you Justin much appreciated mate 🙏🏼
Great video! What I am struggling with now is with muting strings in fingerstyle. If were able to do a tutorial playing some basic tunes with muting methods for the strings in between those you are playing I would find it incredibly helpful 🙂
Excellent Justin. Thank you!
ur welcome! :)
Also this has been one of the best videos about doing scales an muting. Thank you for the clear instructions and visuals
Thank you so much! I found multiple lessons about this but they did not tell me what part of my right hand should be resting on the strings, this really helped me out! I've been practicing this whilst playing solos that I already know!
it kinda tickles my palm so i need to get used to that lol
Thank you! Your words really hit home with me tonight. I’m trying to play Surf style music, which is really clean. I can hear the strings ringing as I lift off each string, and it doesn’t sound good. Thanks for your helpful lesson and mostly for your words, saying that this will take a while and not to get too obsessed with it. I was! 😥 Thanks again and best wishes to you!
Great technique man. Thank you for sharing. You great teacher ✌
I've played bass for years and years. Muting 4 or 5 strings when you're fingering is super easy. When it comes to using a pick, that's really lost me. I though it was wrong to touch other strings with my right hand, but I get it now
Will the techniques shown in this video work for strumming all 6 stings while wanting only 1 note to ring out? For example; how John Frusciante of the Chili Peppers plays "Can't Stop", and how a lot of funk guitar is played in general. Admittedly I care more about that kind of technique than getting rid of excess noise while playing scales.
Muting 5 while playing notes on 1 is a tricky technique and you need to be very conscious of the role each finger does / can play in helping with the muting. Thumb over to mute helps too. Be patient with this, it will take time. Cheers 😊 | Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide & Approved Teacher www.justinguitar.com
Thank you Justin, you cool.
Another great lesson! just what I needed!
Oh man! This lesson is going to help so much!
That was brilliant! Thank you! I was wondering why I wasn't able to mute ...and I wash pushing down super hard with my "free" finger - I like how you explained to use all the fingers, and include the strumming hand. And I love the suggestion to do this with scales - that will be a perfect time to practice this. But it's sort of like a finger choreography we have to work out, isn't it?
Gosh, thank you so much for this lesson
Great tutorial. ‼️
Thabk you for this! I was googling all over to see whats the best way for the picking hand to be. I want to learn it the right way! Thank youuuu Justin
Hey Justin!
Great video, I just wanted to ask, how do you mix this technique with actual palm muting for rock and metal?
One of my problems is when I lift my finger off the frets there's an unintentional open strong noise. I can even lightly apply pressure to the fret and remover my finger and an open string noise is still there. Any tips on how to mute this sound?
If changing chords / playing a song the noise will simply blend in. Don't sweat it too much just now. Cheers 😊
| close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide & Moderator [ www.justinguitar.com/ ]
I have problem with something I would call accidental pull off. when I change chords for example from d to g when I lift of 1st and second finger open G rings out I tried to do it slower but string kind of stick to my finger any advice to that ?
No that's normal, if it is perceptible enough to make it sound bad you are probably just switching too slow/out of beat.
Hey Justin, I can definitely hear the difference the muting makes when you play, but I'm having a hard time understanding why it's necessary. I feel like if you are picking each string neatly you shouldn't need to do this, right? Or is this so that we don't have to worry about only picking one string and can be more careless? In any case, we would only need to mute the strings directly around the string we want to play, right? Feel like I'm missing something
Regarding muting with my strumming hand I always do it instinctively with the side of my hand, unlike your technique that involves the heel of your hand . would you say that's bad technique?
Thanks
Its the most anoying thing for me while im playing,it actually puts me off playing sometimes,i think this is something that comes with time tho rather than trying too practice doing it
O my god I'm first I love you and you help me out alot and thank you for that
Thanks really helps
So subtle !!!
does this mean that while going down one has to mute with the strumming hand and while going up one has to use the fretting hand to mute?
Hey Justin I watched your older video on this ruclips.net/video/oe8J-rcYf0c/видео.html and there you recommend LH muting with your 1st finger rathter than flattening the fretting finger (that's a tongue twister). I wanted to ask which is more preferable, or if there is a situation where one is more preferable than the other.
They both work together. Finger 1 does the lions share, other fingers do less - but in open position it's a little different!
@@justinguitar This has opened some ideas to me. It seems that playing guitar is more about 'mute all the strings that you don't play' rather than 'play these strings'. And these concepts seem to apply to everything, strumming, scales, shredding. Am I wrong? I guess there are some exceptions like in the D chord where you can't mute both E&A and strum.
@@justinguitar Does that mean you don't mute with your first finger when playing in open position?
I've never had difficulties to mute strings, it came easily for me.
But 3 months ago i bought a jazz guitar, and now i'm unable to mute E and A string and i can't get ride of this defect :(
I recall a video in which Justin shows you how to anchor your picking hand for picking accuracy.
Unfortunately I've not been able to find it again... anybody know the video I mean?
I’m really focused on growing a Wes Montgomery picking style using only my thumb, but the get the tone I want I have to angle my wrist a certain way that I can’t mute the ringing string with my palm... how can I fix this? Cause I would rather not use a dampener on the neck
I'm finding the string muting thing to be miserably difficult. Is the palm muting thing even possible if you don't use a pick? Do I actually have to use a pick? That sucks, if that's the case.
No you don't but it is harder indeed. Muting is harder than it looks and it takes time to get a passable result. Additional video on muting: www.justinguitar.com/guitar-lessons/string-muting-techniques-im-134 | LievenDV | JustinGuitar Official Guide
Don't get hung up about it, it's far better to play guitar with a bit of string noise than not play guitar at all, keep learning and playing the songs you like and eventually (because you're aware of the string noise) your fingers will automatically mute them. Took over a year for it to work for me and when it did, I didn't even realise. Above all... Enjoy the guitar.
@@jonshaw9472 honestly, this is the best comment!
Hey, 3 years later, did you ever get your sting muting figured out? So many of the styles I want to play, such as funk and rock, make heavy use of muting and I want to guage how long it will be until I can mute strings consistently.
damn I really wish I come to your channel earlier. What you teach is really amazing and effective thank you so much for teaching!!!
i love it. but why the strange titles now?
?
Trying to drive traffic
It feels so weird to play with the finger down. It’s so wrong, my fingers want to play straight
Why is it necessary to mute when doing scales?
You want to hear the note clearly without others ringing on. Cheers 😊
| close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide [ www.justinguitar.com/ ] & Moderator on JustinGuitar Forum
This feels so wrong... As a former violin player its so weird to put my fingers as horizontal as you do
my lord and savior
When I started I kept on making too many harmonics lol
Early
Doesn't work though. Most guitar can't mute strings no matter how much practice. It requires special hands. It's physically impossible
I've got those hands. It takes lengthy, but medium sized hands and fingers to mute strings. It also depends how you place on the fret board and how you pick the strings with the other hand.
Basically, it isn't really hard for me. There are times I've failed to mute unwanted strings but It just takes learning
Coming from wind instruments, that's a lot to have to think about / do just to play single notes 🥹