Basia Bulat – Before I Knew

Basia Bulat – Before I Knew (Chords)

UPDATE: YouTube are featuring ukulele videos today. And totally stealing my shit.

More Canadian ukulele. Basia Bulat’s debut album, Oh, My Darling, kicks of with this short and sweet ukulele ditty.

The intro is pretty simple. You’re just playing the G,C and E strings open and sliding down the A string.

A similar thing is played during the outro but with triplets and an F chord making this a bit trickier.

I think it’s being played with a pick, so no fancy triplet strums. Each triplet is down, up, down which means you’ve got two down strokes next to each other.

UPDATE: TheAquaticSloth has video tutorial for Before I Knew here.

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17 Comments

toaster June 17th, 2008 10:55 pm

Did you post the correct outro image? The line above mentions triplets and an F chord, which is also shown in the pdf.
Woodshed June 18th, 2008 6:25 am

Thanks, toaster. *fixed*
catherine June 18th, 2008 12:10 pm

It’s like magic, today in class I was thinking that I wanted to check if anyone had these chords! Thanks!
Woodshed June 18th, 2008 9:38 pm

You’re welcome, catherine. Thinking about ukuleles in class? Tsk, tsk.
Tanya January 21st, 2010 10:54 pm

Just wondering what the strum pattern should be for the main part of the song?? I’m a newbie and have figured the rest out.. but am getting the hang of figuring out strumming.. umm.. yeah.
Woodshed January 23rd, 2010 11:03 am

Tanya: Try:

d – d u – u d u

Twice for each chord.
Tanya February 15th, 2010 6:23 am

Thanks for that – I wish there was a tutorial video for this one.. I’m from her hometown so this song has been really nice for me to learn some chords.. !
aquaticsloth September 8th, 2010 6:04 am

Thanks a million for all of this woodshed!! It’s truly been a ton of help in teaching me the ukulele. Anyways, you mention you think this is being played with a pic (a big no-no from what everyone has told me?) but when i pic it versus strum with my index finger the a string really sounds a lot more prevalent which really gives this song its sound in my opinion. So why is picking so bad? And am i possibly just terrible at strumming with my index finger?
Woodshed September 14th, 2010 11:41 am

aquaticsloth: Pics sound too strident to me. And you always get an annoying clicking sound. Plus it limits what you can do technically.

But if you like it, go for it.
Bibs October 28th, 2010 6:17 pm

Is it too stupid to ask what’s the strum pattern for the intro? I kinda understand the rhythm but i don’t know the ups and downs…
I’ve been practicing the main part of this song for some days now, with the strum pattern that you suggested. It sounds good.
aquaticsloth October 28th, 2010 8:24 pm

Hey Bibs try down up down for each chord on the intro putting the emphasis on the C E A strings to get the cool sound Basia gets. I did a little tutorial for it from Woodsheds chords which might help you out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GCZbx9WCsk I think the intro part starts at like 2:30.
Woodshed October 28th, 2010 9:52 pm

Bibs: For the C bits do d u d u etc. Then for the G bits do:

d – d u – u d –

twice.

aquaticsloth: Great! Thanks. I’ll add that to the post.
Bibs October 28th, 2010 9:54 pm

Thanks to both of you!
This is great!
anna April 18th, 2011 4:05 am

does anyone know what the nice little lifting outro chord she plays is? it gives a final touch to the song that is definitely needed after the F chord…
Woodshed April 21st, 2011 12:14 pm

anna: It’s just a C.
Becca August 7th, 2011 5:44 pm

I love Basia, and I’ve pretty much mastered the song, but I’m curious of how fast/how many strums (or the strumming pattern in general) there is for the outro, while doing the C bits. It’s definitely not the same as the casual d-u-d in the intro. Thanks!
Woodshed August 9th, 2011 11:08 am

Becca: The strumming for the outro is the bottom tab in the post.

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Basia Bulat – Before I Knew