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Want to Become a True Musician? Avoid Behaving Like a Dilettante!
Meet Igor Saavedra –
If the word Dilettante sounds strange to some of you, here is a classical dictionary definition:
“Dilettante comes from the Italian word Dilettare, “to delight.” Its connotation is that someone enjoys doing something, but does not take it seriously enough to become a professional at it. Most often used in relation to the arts and often is used as a critical way of describing someone who simply dabbles in the arts and lacks the discipline to perfect their skill.”
In fact I will extend that definition a little bit and bring it more to reality in my own words.
A Dilettante is somebody you don’t have to confuse with the general public or the general audience that have the right to express their opinion whenever they want and how they want. The Dilettante is a person who usually, but not always, keeps a sense of frustration inside him. This sense of frustration makes him feel always insecure, and this insecurity usually comes from his lack of skills, opportunities or discipline…. and mostly from his enormous desire to have become a True Musician and never being able to achieve that.
It’s not a coincidence that those guys usually know much more about music trivia than most of the musicians. When they are “Wealthy Dilettantes”, they usually have the best music collections around, the best amps, and the best instruments. Many times they are the ones who own the best instrument collections including rare editions, etc. Even though they dedicated their life to another profession (usually not by choice), you can find in their houses amazing studios with the cutting edge technology in them. They are experts in knowing names, dates, brands, models, etc. way better than any musician.
What’s the reason for that? Well, for me it seems really obvious… the reason is a matter of “Compensating”…. it’s like the short guy with the huge car… if you know what I mean. For me, the best example of a redeemed “Wealthy Dilettante” is the “Maecenas”.
When the Dilettante is not a wealthy one, he usually manages his ways for “Compensating”, like for example trying at any time (consciously or unconsciously) to find all the failures, mistakes and inabilities as possible on True Musician’s performances, even though they will never be able to play more than 10% than the guy they are talking about. It really doesn’t matter; this urge they have is stronger than their will. It’s fair to add that the “Wealthy Dilettante” is also a candidate to fall into the same sick pattern.
The Dilettante (wealthy or not) needs to destroy… whenever you read any destructive comment in any media (Youtube, forums, etc.), those opinions will always be coming from a Dilettante, and will never come from a True Musician. And of course 99% of the time those destructive comments will be anonymous…. does this sounds familiar to you?
Would you imagine for example Pat Metheny saying that a Patitucci solo is a piece of crap? Of course not, as a musician like Pat doesn’t have the time and the dark energy for something like that, and of course he won’t even think something like that about such a great musician.
But let’s suppose he would think that, he still wouldn’t write such negative things as he knows by his own experience how hard is to make and to play music, and how hard is to dedicate a life to music, so he will respect the artist and won’t say anything that could be destructive or at least non-constructive.
In fact what a True Musician like him or any other musician at this level would say if they found any “not very good performance” in any media, would always be constructive because of the reasons I mentioned before. They will try to find all the positive aspects in there… where is the potential, and if they find something they don’t like, they will always express that idea in a constructive way saying that this can be improved by doing this or that, never destructing anybody as I said before… that’s Dilettante’s Business.
It’s amazing how NOBODY escapes from the Dilettante’s reach. Take a tour on Youtube for example and you will see how amazing musicians like Dave Weckl, Chick Corea, Stevie Wonder, Maxim Vengerov, Claudio Arrau, Daniel Barenboim, Jean Luc Ponty, etc., and eventually all the great musicians you can think about, are always being battered, many times in extremely disrespectful ways by the Dilettantes.
The other thing that the Dilettante loves to do is to COMPARE musician “A” with musician “B”, transforming himself into a sort of gambler finding who’s better so to be able to bid on the fastest horse. True Musicians are not horses that are competing against the other one so to entertain the Dilettantes… True Musicians are human beings trying hard to make ART, True Musicians are not comparing themselves with the musician next door in any form… and this is again Dilettante’s business.
So this article is just some humble advice to help you construct a solid identity as a musician. If you want to achieve the goal of becoming a True Musician, start right now by avoiding falling into this destructive behavior, and it’ll be way better if you do so at a young age. If after reading this article you come to the conclusion that you have already fallen into this toxic pattern on some occasions, try to correct that ASAP… it’s never too late. As I said on this article’s title…
Want to Become a True Musician? Avoid Behaving Like a Dilettante!
See you guys on my next article!
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Photo: Self-portrait by Melissa Auf Der Maur
Melissa Auf Der Maur is a Canadian bassist who played with Tinker, Hole, and The Smashing Pumpkins. She released her own work and is a photographer with photos published in Nylon, Bust, and National Geographic. She released her ‘90s Rock Memoir “Even The Good Girls Will Cry” on 17 March 2026.
KB: Did you always want to be a singer-musician growing up?
I’ve played music my whole life. In school, I played trumpet and sang in a children’s choir, so music was always within me. My mother was the first female disc jockey on the Montreal airwaves; her record collection played a huge role in my inspiration and love of music.
KB: When did you start playing bass, and why this instrument?
When I was 19, the early 90s music explosion began to percolate in tiny clubs around the world. I was lucky to be a ticket girl at Montreal’s underground music club. In one year, I saw Hole, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins, White Zombie, and The Breeders – all had female bass players. That’s when the seed was planted. By the age of 22, I was the bass player of Hole.
KB: Which brands of basses have you used in your career, and which one are you using now?
The first bass that I learned on was a vintage Squier Precision. Hole was sponsored by Fender guitars, so I upgraded to Fender Custom Shop Precisions. That is all I play, but I have a cool vintage 8-string Greco that I use on recordings to thicken up guitar parts.
KB: What equipment do you use or have you used with your basses?
Ampeg SVT amps and cabinets, a couple of Sans-Amp pedals, and that is it.
KB: How did you become a member of Hole, and what is your fondest memory of that time?
Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins was helping scout a replacement for (RIP) Kristen Pfaff, Hole’s bass player. My band, Tinker, opened for them on the Siamese Dream tour, so Billy had seen me play and could vouch for me. Courtney trusted her talented friend, and that was it. I initially said “no thank you” due to my commitment to my photographic studies and the drama and chaos surrounding the band during the “Live Through This” album release. Courtney took it as a good sign that I said no, so convinced me to reconsider, and soon after, I accepted their invitation, in the name of helping put females in the male-dominated landscape of rock music. My fondest memory is every show we played as a mostly female band, symbolizing what a woman could do in a rock band. Every show had a purpose: get more women to play music.
KB: You are a photographer as well. What makes a great picture? Do you shoot in color or b/w?
I started shooting photographs at age 15. Initially only shot black & white and worked in the art school darkroom. In university, I took a color photography course, and shifted mostly and forever to that, because it was easier to process film on the road when I joined a rock band. I experimented with many cameras, point and shoots, manual, polaroids, medium format, and vintage finds. The trick to a good photograph is to shoot many and all the time – the magic is in the edit and selection process.
KB: Are there artists you would love to collaborate with or wish you had?
??I’ve been lucky to collaborate with some of my favorite musicians in my career. I would still love to collaborate with a new generation heavy electronic artist on an analog bass, heavy electronic drums, and synths collaboration project. Take me out of my usual zone, merging the past and future: my love of 80s dark new wave and new artists exploring that genre. It was very futuristic back then, and we are now, after all, living in the future. I am in the mood to play bass to heavy beats I want to dance to.
KB: What are your 7 favorite bass lines in music across all genres? And why these 7?
“Mountain Song” – Jane’s Addiction (love a rambling, rolling bass line – feels like the ocean waves)
“Black Top – Helmet” (was the first bass line I taught myself)
“Gold Dust Woman” – Hole from “The Crow 2” Soundtrack (it was my first bass line contribution to the band)
“Get Ready” – The Temptations (Motown just feels so good, because of the bass)
“Lucretia My Reflection” – Sisters of Mercy (makes me want to hit the dance floor and play bass simultaneously)
“Be My Druidess” – Type O Negative (full chord bass playing at its best by iconic, demonic, Peter Steele, RIP)
“Romantic Rights” – Death from Above (1979 – unique distorted overdriven tone, combined dance rhythm and melodic intelligence, all in one shot – also! Shout out to a bass & drum only band, which is awesome, and we should have more of, but the bass player needs to be a killer to fill that role.
KB: What are you currently up to?
Releasing my ‘90s Rock Memoir “EVEN THE GOOD GIRLS WILL CRY”. Visceral healing process, it was to get it out of me and write it, but I suspect the real magic will begin by putting it into the world and reflecting with others on what the magic of the ‘90s was all about. Powerful music decade that carried us into what is now a brave new world of digital corporate weirdness – may the past shed a light on our future. That’s my hope for this book release and tour.
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