(upbeat guitar music)
- What's up, everybody?
It is your good friend Justus West,
the leader of the Justus League
and I am back to talk about a technique
that you might already use,
but you don't know it.
And that is why we should talk about it,
so you can hone in on it and evolve it.
And that technique is left-hand muting.
There are times when you use your right hand
to mute things, which sounds like this.
And you wanna get kind of that plucky sound,
but there are also times where you're playing something
with your left hand that does not use
all the strings at the same time.
And so you'll find yourself muting.
And so what I wanna do is break down this concept some
and give you guys some awesome things to do
if you're struggling with this concept to practice it.
Alright, guys, let's start right in.
I wanna give you guys a cool way
to start approaching this left-hand meeting technique.
So we're gonna start with a G major kinda triad.
And so we're gonna put our ring finger on G,
on the fifth fret on the D string.
Then we're gonna take our middle finger
and put it on B on the fourth fret of the G string.
Then we're gonna take our first finger
and put it on D, or the third fret of the B string.
Now, it's an awesome triad, again,
we're only using three out of our six available strings.
And so what happens with the rest of those strings?
Well, we have to mute them so that they don't play
or ring out while we're trying to play this chord.
So the first thing I want you to take note of
is that we are muting the high E string
with our first finger.
So our first finger is pressing down
on D on the B string,
but it's also not fully pressing down
the high E string so that when I do a full strum,
you don't hear it.
Mind you, I'm strumming all the way through,
and it only brings out those three notes.
Now, when you get into chord progressions,
it's awesome because you can simplify your chords
so that you fit into a band better.
Sometimes it's not necessary to play a chord
that has the root note and the third
and the octave and all the extra stuff.
And sometimes you just wanna play simple chords.
Now, the other thing I want you to pay attention to
is that you're going to wanna mute the A string
with your third finger or your ring finger.
So we're meeting that high E string
with our first finger.
We're also muting the D string
with our ring finger.
And so what's happening is, as I'm pushing down
on G on the D string,
the tip of my finger or the pad of my finger
is catching the A string.
You'll actually just kind of feel it
so you won't press it down at all.
You're actually putting pressure from below the string.
See how I'm strumming through?
You still only get three notes.
Now there's one more piece of this
with these type of triads,
and that's your thumb coming over the neck
and muting the low E string.
Now, some people don't do this.
Some of you might even use thumb-over cords
and you use your thumb to play the bass note,
which is awesome as well.
But sometimes we don't need that low root note.
So what do we do?
We use our thumb to mute it.
So I literally am putting my thumb
over the neck here, as you can see,
and the kind of joint part of my finger,
which you might have a different sized hand,
so it might be in a different spot.
But the joint part of my finger
is touching this E string here.
And that's how you get into those super funky rhythms.
Shout out to my good friend, Cory Wong,
who does this very often
by muting the other strings of the guitar
using fingers that are kind of on the neck,
and maybe not on the neck,
so that you can get good, funky but clean
and tight rhythm out of your triads.
I'm gonna show you another common time
you'll wanna have to mute stuff with your left hand.
And that's when you're playing
more of these pop-style, three note chords.
So I'll show you guys this progression.
It's an E minor.
Hmm.
So let me, hmm.
So let me show you guys this progression
that we can use to practice this technique.
So we wanna play E minor,
but we're gonna put our first finger on E,
or on the seventh fret of the A string.
Then we wanna take our ring finger
and put that on B, which is the ninth fret of the D string.
And then we wanna take our middle finger
and play G on the B string,
which would be the eighth fret on the B string.
So, oftentimes as a pop producer,
I will use chords like this
because they don't have so many notes
and they're not so busy that a singer can't,
you know, sing and do their thing on it.
And that progression is just E minor,
C major, D major.
So for the C major, you'd take your first finger,
put it on C on the A string or the third fret,
take your ring finger, put it on G
on the D string on the fifth fret,
and then take your pinky and put it on the fifth fret
of the B string.
And then our D major shape
is the exact same finger pattern,
you just slide it up a whole step.
Now, where we get into this left-hand muting,
is that I'm using my first finger.
'Cause normally for this type of chord, I'd be barring.
But instead of barring and pressing down every string,
I'm actually using my first finger
to mute those strings.
So I'm pressing down on the A string,
pressing down on the D string,
but I'm using my first finger to mute the G string
and to mute the high E string.
Again, you see how I'm strumming really hard
and really aggressively?
But only those three notes are coming through.
You'll be most likely to use
this left-hand muting technique
in funky grooves, like what I opened up with
and what I showed you with the G chord,
and also in those pop-style grooves
with the three note chords
that I just showed you guys.
I hope that this actually helps you
be aware of even your left-hand muting.
Most of you guys probably already do it
and don't realize it,
and I hope for those of us
who are maybe trying to figure out why your chords
don't sound as clean or as crisp as some other players,
that maybe you're more aware of it
so that you can actually try applying it.
Again, left-hand muting is awesome
and there's so many combinations of things
that you can do with left-hand muting
and chords and removing notes and adding notes.
So experiment, don't be afraid to experiment
and just have fun with it.
It's guitar, and it's supposed to just be
a joyous time every time you pick it up.
Hope this information helps you guys out a lot.
Shout out to my friends at Fender
who are always awesome.
And shout out to you guys, the viewers,
for also being awesome and watching all of this.
I'm out of here. Peace.