Palm Muting

Palm muting is a technique that adds more of a percussive feel to your playing. Using this technique you muffle the strings just enough so you can still here the notes that you are playing but it adds almost like a rhythmic chop to it adding more of that percussive sound.

The technique is done by assuming the regular picking position where your palm is sitting comfortably on the bridge of the guitar as shown in our lesson on basic picking. To palm mute, just move your picking hand slightly enough so your palm is resting more on the guitar strings instead of the guitar bridge. For example.

In tab, palm mutes are usually notated with a PM (standing for Palm Mute) with a line after it telling you how long to continue palm muting or there is an 'x' above or below each note or chord you are supposed to palm mute. In the above example you palm mute a G power chord 3 times.

As already discussed you just have to move your palm off the bridge and more on to the guitar strings to get the palm mute sound. Here are some things to be aware of.

• - Moving your hand so the palm is completely on the strings is to far, this will mute the notes to much.
• - Keeping your palm completely on the bridge won't give you any palm mutes.
• - A balance of your palm partially on the bridge and partially on the strings is the perfect position for the perfect palm mute
• - Its not need to apply alot of pressure on the strings for palm mutes. Resting your hand comfortably will be sufficient.
• - Apply the same amount of pressure across all strings being muted. Otherwise some strings may be palm muted while other could ring clear.

Following the above guidelines and with some practice, your palm mutes will come easy.