Palm muting

[elparkirio]

Anyone got any good techniques for palm muting? I'm really finding it quite tricky and everyone i see using it makes it look easy

[Jason Lynch]

try Jeff Newmans Right hand course. also, paul sutherland has a good video on it.

[elparkirio]

Cheers Jason, i'll have a butchers

[Nick Bidmade]

I'm of the Les Paul school.
Break your little finger and have it reset so it does the job - coz my little finger don't do it the way God made it!

[Tony Russell Davis]

I assume you are thinking of single note runs. Chording requires you hand to be mostly off the strings anyway.
You will often see advice to "pick then drop the edge of your hand onto the strings". That is an approximation because it really works the other way. You rest your hand-edge on the strings and slightly lift when you pick. The action of picking almost lifts the edge as you reach for a string. When you "get it" you'll find that you can be even more economical and turn right wrist very slightly until a gap opens between the relevant string and part of your hand near the fingers. I find that the back back of my palm often doesn't even leave the lower strings. Remember, your picking hand should be "following" the bar-hand as you move them forward and back across the strings from high to low and vice-versa. That puts the groove of your hand-edge (the end of the "life-line?)" roughly over the picked string and forms a kinda "bridge" at that point.
Also you don't have to block every note if it's too fast to do that; and upper strings should get blocked by the extended bar-hand fingers as you draw the bar back to pick lower strings.
Hope that's helpful? Tone

[elparkirio]

Cheer Tony, noted. Nick, no thanks

[Nick Bidmade]

I think I'll try Tony's suggestions first

[James Crowbear]

Tony's got it sussed imo
keeping the right hand on the strings is where it's at
moving it around & up & down is wasting energy that should be devoted to picking & muting
picking a psg requires constant muting whether it's palm blocking or pick blocking
learning & doing both is even better imo
palm blocking for chords & pick blocking for runs & scales
don't forget that one can also mute certain strings w: the thumb of the bar hand
Golly, is'nt Musik fun ?

[elparkirio]

thanks james, noted

[Nick Bidmade]

On second thoughts, I think it's my wrist that needs breaking and re-setting!