Idol Chatter & Voice Views

A year ago, M.K. Nobilette loved to sing, but “never thought music was an achievable goal as a career.”

American Idol has changed all that, the 20-year-old from San Francisco said during a Friday afternoon conference call with the media.

Ryan Seacrest with M.K. Nobilette just before her elimination Thursday night on American Idol. (FOX Photo)

After all, the stint on Idol provided her with a “great fan base.”

And making the Top 10 means she’ll be part of the Idol summer tour, giving her a chance to travel the country doing what she loves and a chance to hone on-stage performance skills she admits are in need of refinement.

“I do need to up my stage presence,” she said. “I wish it had gotten better during the show. I think it improved, but I started at a very low confidence level.”

That has improved, too, thanks to Idol, to the point where M.K. is talking about a debut album that would be some sort of mix of folk and rock, with some strings and horns mixed in.

M.K. said she wasn’t surprised to land in the bottom of the voting this week because she did “fumble the lyrics” on her cover of Pink’s “Perfect” Wednesday night.

And she didn’t expect the judges to use their save Thursday night after she performed “All of Me.”

It turned out to be one of her best performances on Idol.

“I felt like if I was going to leave, I was going to leave with a bang and give a good performance,” she said.

And, regardless of where she finished, she’ll be remembered as the first openly gay contestant on Idol.

M.K. admits she was “a little taken aback at first” over the attention that got.

“I’m a singer and I’m also gay. I’m proud about it. I’m open about it. It was fine,” she said.

“I felt like it was an important thing to know about me,” M.K. added. “And I’m hoping to be a good role model for other people who are afraid to come out or who think they can’t try things like American Idol (because of their sexuality).”