# Muting & ghost notes

Bass strings ring forever if you let them. Clean metal and funk both start with controlled silence.

## Ghost-note lab

Three cells of real notes plus ghosts, printed as TAB with the count above. Pitches are open E (E1)
and its fifth B on the A string at fret 2; the rake cell drags across the open D and A strings.

1. **Note on the beat, ghost on the "and"** — eight eighths where only the numbers are pitched.
2. **Ghosts filling the space between roots** — root E on 1, fifth B on 3, ghosts on beats 2 and 4.
3. **Rake into the root** — two muted sixteenths on the "and" and "a" of 4, landing on open E.

The lab plays a fingered electric bass, so its ghosts are quiet, clipped versions of the same note.
That teaches where ghosts go and how much quieter they have to be, and nothing about the dead thud
itself — that part is your left hand.

## Why silence matters

Definition, groove, and mix clarity. Drive/OD makes bad muting worse.

## Left-hand mute

Unused fingers lightly kill idle strings. Re-establish mutes after shifts.

## Right-hand / palm

Light palm shortens sustain; thumb mutes lower strings; follow-mute chokes before rests.

## Ghost notes

`x` in TAB — full right-hand motion, no clear pitch. Keep the groove moving.

## Rakes

Muted drag into a target pitch; rake quieter than the target.

## Drones vs mute

Open-string drones can be intentional — choose which string may ring.

## Common faults

Choked notes, pitchy ghosts, late mutes, over-palming.

## TAB seeds

Root+ghosts; gallop-ready silence; intentional E drone under fretted A.

## Why a bass rings longer than a guitar

Not a discipline problem — the instrument. A bass string is longer, heavier and under more tension, so
one pluck stores far more energy, and low frequencies are the ones a room hangs on to. Two consequences:
you always notice over-ring later than it happened, so the mute has to be planned rather than reactive;
and habits that survive on the D and G strings will not survive the E string or a down-tuned low string.

## The mute is a rhythm event

Not "play the note and then stop it" but "note on 1, mute on the 'and' of 1" — two events, both on the
grid. Move the mute to the "a" and the note is three-quarters as long, evenly, every time. A ghost is
just a mute you plucked, which is why the two skills share a page. The tell that it has landed: all
your rests are the same length.

## Muting under gain
Clean then driven passes; raise mute standard with gain.

## Ghost streams
16th muted streams into a clear downbeat root.

## Hearing a mute you cannot hear

You cannot judge muting from the playing position. Play at a whisper so ring you were masking with
volume becomes obvious; listen to nothing but beats 2 and 4 of a chosen cell; record it and boost the
low mids on playback, where open-string ring lives. Then repeat with drive on.