Four years ago, Natalia Bonfini, who grew up in Eastham, found herself in Nashville, face to face with American Idol judges Katy Perry, Lionel Richie, and Luke Bryan. She would go on to leave the show a top-50 finalist. “American Idol was such a blip of excitement,” says Bonfini. “I feel like a very different artist now.”
She’s currently performing with a band made up of Cape Cod locals: Keb Hutchings on guitar, Dave Ellis on drums, and Rich Hill on bass. They’ll perform at First Night Chatham, a series of concerts and events to celebrate the New Year, on Dec. 31 at the Orpheum Theater at 8 and 9 p.m.
Bonfini started learning the guitar at age seven. Her father, Galileo, played the drums. “I wanted to be like him,” she says, “but different at the same time.” She was a songwriter who “wrote like crazy,” she says. “I had notebooks and notebooks of songs.” While other kids listened to the Wiggles, Bonfini listened to Led Zeppelin, Johnny Cash, Janis Joplin, and Ray Charles.
When she was 12, Bonfini busked on Commercial Street in Provincetown, watching summer visitors pass her by. She performed a mix of originals and covers — mostly blues and rock. “The toughest crowd is on the street,” she says. “I played whatever would get people to listen.”
Bonfini went to Nauset Regional High School and then Lesley University in Cambridge. She graduated in 2018 — the same year her single “Before” won the New England Songwriting Competition — with a double-degree in counseling psychology and expressive art therapy. “I wanted to be a music therapist,” she says.
The next step was to escape: “I needed to get away from this small town where everybody knew me.” Bonfini moved to Tampa, Fla., where she was a social worker — a job she loved. But then she played at a restaurant’s open mic, and within three months she had quit the social-work job and was playing five shows a week at different venues. In 2019, she released her first and only album: Beyond the Broken Pieces.
Her music was “a different kind of therapy,” Bonfini says. “People could come in after work and just relax. I thought I was actually making more of an impact.” After a few years of traveling back and forth between Florida and Eastham, in 2020 Bonfini decided to come home for good. “Just because you go somewhere bigger doesn’t mean you’ll be inspired,” she says. Tampa was a sea of unfamiliar faces. “I remember coming home and rolling down my window and being like” — she pauses for effect — “ ‘It’s quiet!’ ”
In Eastham, she had no musical connections. “I pulled up maps of Main Street, Hyannis, Main Street, Orleans, Main Street, Chatham and started cold-calling restaurants. I’d say, ‘Do you have music?’ ” That first summer she played 7 to 10 shows a week, she says, nearly all cover gigs. “I definitely was hustling, trying to get my name out there.”
In 2021, Bonfini received a message from American Idol casting producers inviting her to audition. At first, wary that it was a scam, she said, “No, thank you.” They sent more details; Bonfini went through several rounds of auditions on Zoom. Only when they sent her two plane tickets to Nashville — one for her mother, Wendy, because Bonfini wasn’t about to turn down “a free girls’ trip” — did she believe it was real.
Days of filming led to five minutes to prove herself in front of the judges. She auditioned with “Whipping Post” by the Allman Brothers Band. Lionel Richie and Luke Bryan said yes; Katy Perry said no.
Perry preferred pop, says Bonfini. The next round of the show, in L.A., was a “genre challenge,” says Bonfini. Competitors had to choose a song to sing from one of five genres. “I didn’t feel like I really fit into any of them,” she says. But she chose rock and sang “Hand in My Pocket” by Alanis Morissette — “Katy Perry is a very big Alanis fan,” she says. Bonfini was the only woman from the rock genre to make it to the next round.
She was ultimately sent home as a finalist after the duet round, in which she sang “Lean on Me” by Bill Withers with a 16-year-old fellow competitor. “I didn’t even cry,” she says. “I was exhausted. I went home and sat on my bed.”
She spent some time being disappointed: “I had gotten attached to a dream I didn’t have five months ago.” Then, with her father’s encouragement, she formed a band and kept gigging.
But Bonfini didn’t want to play cover shows forever. In the past year, she’s stepped away from the incessant grind. With fewer but bigger shows, she says she’s fallen back into songwriting. “It’s good and scary at the same time,” she says. She’ll play a few new songs at First Night and hopes to release a second album in 2025.
It’s been “a year of love,” says Bonfini. She got married in October to Clay Hansinger, a social worker she met in Florida. Her songs tend to reflect her current state of mind. She wrote some about her time on American Idol, too, pulling inspiration from the pressure she felt.
Some of her original band members have gone, but some have stayed. In addition to the musicians who will play alongside her at First Night, there’ll also be a “special guest” who Bonfini won’t yet name. The performance is an example of what Bonfini wants to do more of — playing for “listening crowds,” with a ticket-buying sit-down audience. She’s still playing in restaurants to pay the bills. “I do a lot of weddings and private events,” she says. She’s just come back from Cape Abilities in Hyannis, where she performed Christmas carols.
“Idol was a way to capture people’s attention, which I’m really grateful for,” says Bonfini. “Without it, I don’t think I’d be able to do these original sets and fill an audience.”
Looking forward, Bonfini’s got big plans. She bought land off Brackett Road in Eastham and is building a house. “I’m the general contractor,” she says. “I’m learning as I go. Luckily, I come from a family of construction workers. My dad’s a mason, my uncle’s a framer.” The house will include a music studio. “My poor husband won’t have to sit and listen to me play all the time anymore.”
She’s also started a booking business, Bonfini Entertainment. “I’ve realized there’s so much art in music but no organization,” she says. “I love to organize. I’m not afraid to talk money.” The business was a way to be involved in music without burning out on performing. “It’s been three years, and now I work with over 100 musicians all over the Cape.”
For the last 20 years, says Bonfini, “I’ve only known songwriting on my own, just me and a guitar in my bedroom.” She’s imagining growth there, too, with the help of guitarist Hutchings. “He has this sound that I always envisioned but was never able to play myself.” The songs they write together are “very bluesy” and wholly new for Bonfini, who has a grungy-sweet, easy voice that seems to claim any song it sings. “I’m starting to sound a little bit more like the songs that made me fall in love with music,” she says.
A Little Night Music
The event: Natalia Bonfini plays with her band at First Night Chatham
The time: Tuesday, Dec. 31, 8 and 9 p.m.
The place: Orpheum Theater, 637 Main St., Chatham
The cost: $30, ages 12 and up, $5 ages 3 to 11, 2 and under free; see firstnightchatham.com. for more information
