How to Play Depot Blues by Son House (Guitar Lesson)

Scene 1
Orville introduces the tune, plays through the solo he will teach and talks a little about bluesman Son House, upon whose playing Orville's guitar arrangement is based.

House was born near Clarksdale Mississippi, raised there and in Louisiana, was drawn to preaching in the Baptist church and at age 15 was actually a practicing pastor. He started playing guitar in his early 20s and moved back to Mississippi and played alongside other major blues pioneers Charley Patton, Robert Johnson, and Willie Brown. He spent time in prison after killing a man, allegedly in self-defense. His first recordings were made for the Paramount label in 1928 and 29. Arguably his best cuts were made for Alan Lomax and the Library of Congress in 1942 and 43. He disappeared from the music scene for many years until his rediscovery in the early 60s. He was in ill health by then but still managed to play many concerts and make several new recordings. His grave is in Mt Hazel Cemetery in Detroit Michigan.

He was a great slide guitar player and a mighty singer and a huge influence on Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson and others. His music is still played today. The White Stripes covered his song Death Letter Blues and played it at the 2004 Grammy Awards.

Scene 2
Orville describes the chords we need to know. E, A7, and B7. The B7 shape will be moved up to make a C7 and a C#7 toward the end of the piece. The song starts with a long slide on the 5th string. Orville talks about how do this accurately and with a smooth sound. He also shows how to get a snappy, popping sound out of the bass strings.

Another subject that is well covered is finger damping or pick damping, the act of bringing your picking finger back down on the string to stop the note you just played. In this lesson Orville plays with bare fingers rather than fingerpicks which contributes to his round tone. He talks about keeping your right hand fingers in touch with the strings and not letting them fly too far away. This helps with your accuracy and tone.

Scene 3
Orville continues with the first three licks of the song that happen over an E chord. They all start with the sliding 5th string move and all three use mostly the same notes on strings 1 and 2 with slight variations in phrasing and timing.

Scene 4
The first chord change takes us to an A7. We hold the chord with our left hand and play a phrase with our picking hand that includes what Orville calls a rest stroke. This name comes from classical guitar conventions and you should make sure you get this idea because we'll use it a lot in subsequent lessons. More about two hand damping here, too, to cut off the E chord when you return to it and give it a percussive, staccato sound.

Scene 5
More detail on the rest stroke. Orville talks about not rushing, not hurrying when you play blues. Cultivate a relaxed manner and try to take as long as you can to get from one place to another, taking care to do so without dragging the song tempo.

Scene 6
Orville recaps the tune up to the point we're currently at.

Scene 7
Orville demonstrates the next lick on the E chord moving on strings 1 and 3. This lick finishes with two strums on the chord.

Scene 8
Now we're at the last bit of the tune using the B7 shape. In this scene, Orville breaks down the strum pattern for this section and talks about how to make the feel of the groove present while still hitting the accented chords. We then wrap up the song by repeating the lick from Scene 7.

Scene 9
Orville plays the whole song one more time and talks about different things you can do with your thumb on the 6th string in the early part of the tune. Think about those train whistles while you play this song!

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