The “warm, supple mezzo” of Dominican-American mezzo-soprano Melisa Bonetti has been cited by Opera Today for “commanding a wonderful presence in the lower middle voice but also easily soaring heavenward with a well-schooled top.”

Bonetti has recently performed with the Virginia Opera in the roles of Olga Olsen in Street Scene and Zerlina in Don Giovanni, about which the Richmond Times raved, “Melisa Bonetti as the peasant Zerlina is a standout, vocally and in her charismatic characterization.” There she also performed in new works as Eva in Jack Perla’s An American Dream, Johanna in Michael Gilbertson’s Breaking, and Autumn in Christopher Weiss and John de los Santos’ Service Provider. Bonetti can be heard on the Grammy^® nominated original cast recording of Robert Paterson’s Three Way as Tyler, a role she premiered with Nashville Opera and American Opera Projects and later revisited with Shreveport Opera.

Committed to the importance of equality and diversity within the artistic world, Bonetti co-produced with Vital Opera a virtual benefit recital featuring Hispanic repertoire during the pandemic to support children’s music education.

Bonetti has shown her versatility as a performer in recent engagements as Anita in West Side Story with the Brott Music Festival in Ontario; as Marta in Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta with Queen City Opera; and in the premiere of The Bradbury Tattoos, A Rock Opera with Concert:nova in Cincinnati. Previously, she was invited on a concert tour in Bologna, Italy after completing the International Voice Masterclass Ebe Stignani. Other roles she has performed include Die Knusperhexe in Hansel und Gretel, Mercedes and the title role (cover) in Carmen, Lilith in Dracula; Bloodlines (premiere), Clare in A Woman in Morocco (premiere), Emelda in Champion (workshop), Alisa in Lucia di Lammermoor, Delilah (cover), Wowkle in Fanciulla del West, Abuela in La Vida Breve, Maria Maddalena in Galileo Galilei, Emilia in Otello, Flora in La Traviata, Marcellina in Le Nozze di Figaro, Isabela in La Hija de Rappaccini, Federico Garcia Lorca in Ainadamar, and Maddalena in Rigoletto. She has been seen on the stages of Union Avenue Opera, Nashville Opera, Opera Columbus, Dayton Opera, Dayton Performing Arts Alliance, Kentucky Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Queen City Opera, Cincinnati Chamber Opera, Des Moines Metro Opera and the Shippensburg Festival.

Bonetti has sung in concert with the Lexington Philharmonic, Queens Symphony Orchestra, Richmond Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic and Queens College Orchestra in works like Mozart’s Requiem and Handel’s Messiah, El Amor Brujo, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, and selections from Das Knaben Wunderhorn. She can be heard on the album Latin Landscapes in an arrangement of Granados Tonadillas with the CCM Wind Orchestra, released on Naxos in 2015.  

Bonetti completed her master’s degree at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and her bachelor’s degree at Queens College’s Aaron Copland School of Music in New York. She attended the inaugural I Sing Beijing program now known as SING!, and participated in the studio artist program at Wolf Trap.