u/ExperientialWiener

I’ve been playing for a while and I’ve got my scales down to the point of knowing all my scale degrees & being able to target specific chord tones or use flats musically. I was still struggling to play breaks that sounded musical, or sounded like bluegrass. But somebody told me today that I should base my lines on the vocal melody, and use all of the theory in my head to play with that core melody. So for example, on Nine Pound Hammer, I would previously have just tried to noodle with G major and toss in a lot of b3s and b7s… but today I tried to approach it like my guitar was the vocalist singing “well a nine pound hammer….” And then in between lines I’d kinda noodle and sometimes I’d add hammers and chromatics to the vocal lines. I noticed that I was playing a lot more from what I heard in my head rather than thinking so much about the changes. I guess I’m trying to understand if that is how more experienced bluegrass players approach a break. Is not-thinking a good thing? Should I feel like I’m applying theory ? Or should it just show up when I let my fingers fly?

I’m new to bluegrass jams and want to make sure I don’t come off as rude. When I’m strumming chords and doing the boom chuck, is it appropriate to palm mute or should I let it ring? I don’t want to play louder than the lead obviously. And are upstrokes discouraged? I haven’t mastered many fiddle tunes to the point of knowing which are “supposed” to have upstroke in the rhythm