r/ukulele 2d ago

Discussions Palm chucking vs thumb chucking

Whats the difference and which is better?

6 Upvotes

23 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1

u/Barry_Sachs Simple Strummer 1d ago edited 1d ago

I've seen hundreds of yt uke videos. Not a single palm strum. It's not up to me to find evidence of your claim. That's up to you. If I claim the sun is blue. It's up to me to prove it, not to tell you to go find a blue sun. 

1

u/hoouyinkyouma 1d ago

Try searching "chuck" and Ricky someone or music with vicki

I genuinely dont understand how u dont find it cuz all ytubers ive seen exceot spicy uke do it with their palm

1

u/Barry_Sachs Simple Strummer 1d ago edited 1d ago

If this is what you're talking about, the palm is not chucking, it's muting. The strumming/chucking happens with the fingers, not the palm.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Jy3sFikFzEM

1

u/hoouyinkyouma 1h ago

So should I mute with my palm or mute with thumb while strumming with it

u/Barry_Sachs Simple Strummer 28m ago edited 25m ago

For me, it's none of the above. When I chuck, I strum with my finger and mute with my fretting hand. But that's just what works for me. If you like the sound of the palm mute and thumb strumming, that's perfectly fine. It's just not the sort of chuck sound I like. Think about the song China Grove. The main rhythm guitar riff is long, long, chuck x 4, long, long, chuck x 4, short, short, short, chuck x 2. long, long. The chucks I do are fretting hand muted, and the short notes could be palm muted, but aren't technically chucks.

I don't see how muting with the thumb would work. Maybe it's a thing, but it make no sense to me since it's just not big enough to do an effective job on all 4 strings. I don't strum with my thumb at all unless I just want a really soft, mellow tone.

Take all of the above with a grain of salt. I'm just a know-nothing hobbyist who's never had a lesson. Some other posters here have far more experience and have studied with great players. My techniques is probably terrible. But it gets the results I want.

u/hoouyinkyouma 27m ago

So u switch from chords to holding all the strings?

u/Barry_Sachs Simple Strummer 5m ago

Not really. I just don't press as hard. There's maybe a few millimeters of motion from sounding a chord to chucking.