Topmusicanswers
The basic idea of fret-hand muting is to simply relax the hand muscles without actually letting go of, or breaking contact with, the strings. You can think of fret-hand muting as similar to playing a piano keyboard — apply downward pressure when you want sound to occur, and release it when you want it to stop.
Why do my guitar strings sound muted?
Why does my guitar sound muffled? The guitar strings will sound muffled or muted when there is not enough finger pressure or the fingers are placed in the wrong position on the guitar.
How can I get better at muting guitar?
Try to rest your fretting fingers against the adjacent idle strings - this'll mute them out for you. Also, it's easy to strum too hard, so try to target only the strings in the chords. Incidentally, if you're struggling with the rhythm take a look at the boxout on the right.
