Carly Rose Sonenclar was X Factor runner-up. Then she started a podcast

She reached Broadway before her television audition

Sonenclar had already played children in stage productions in New York and on tour before her television audition. Her professional career began in 2006 as Pearl in The Night of the Hunter at the New York Musical Theatre Festival. That year, she made her Broadway debut as Young Cosette in Les Miserables. In 2009, she originated Carrie on the national tour of Little House on the Prairie, the Musical, which starred Melissa Gilbert. She returned to Broadway in 2011 as Chloe, Alice’s daughter, in Wonderland.

Britney Spears mentored her to the runner-up finish

Britney Spears mentored Sonenclar on The X Factor in 2012. For the second week of live shows, she sang Bruno Mars’s “It Will Rain” without the backup dancers and flashing lights used the previous week. L.A. Reid praised the performance’s honesty. Spears said Sonenclar should have closed the show: “Because nobody can follow that.” Her later performances included “Over the Rainbow” and “Rolling in the Deep”. In the final, she sang “Feeling Good”, “How Do I Live” with LeAnn Rimes, and “Hallelujah”. She finished as runner-up on December 20.

School gave her experiences to write about

In March 2013, Carly Rose Sonenclar announced during a Radio Disney Top 30 Countdown interview that Syco Music had picked up her recording option. She said the next step was finding the right label. She also chose to remain in school, a decision she linked to her mental state and her writing. She wanted real experiences to supply material for songs. By the time she released “Birds & Bees” on June 19, 2019, she had spent years in sessions with writers and producers. She told Flaunt that she wanted to feel sure of the music she released. Her advice was direct: “Trust your intuition and don’t settle.”

“twentyone” addressed the pressure of early fame

She put the pressure of early fame into “twentyone”, released on July 8, 2020. Sonenclar wrote it when she was 20, thinking about Juice WRLD and Lil Peep, who had both died at 21. She described feeling connected to their ambitions and wanting the song to help people deal with their deaths. In her American Songwriter interview that month, she also explained how difficult it had been to speak up in early recording sessions. Her debut EP, Wild, followed in September. Its title track paired her with singer Goody Grace. The project also included “Song of the Summer”.

A friendship became Ex Factors in 2024

In 2024, Carly Rose Sonenclar’s friendship with Diamond White became the basis of Ex Factors. Sonenclar said their conversations kept returning to The X Factor, often while they were out together. They realized other people might want to hear those exchanges. Their friendship had passed through a quieter period while Sonenclar attended college and White worked on acting and music. Reconnecting gave Sonenclar someone who understood being a child on the same show. “Wait, I’ve needed you all this time,” she recalled. Recording the podcast gave the friends a reason to meet in the studio and make time for each other.

Hosting helped her talk about her childhood fame

Hosting also changed how Sonenclar spoke about the competition. In May 2024, she told Biff Bam Pop! that there had been a period when she resented having new work compared with performances from childhood. The podcast gave her a place to talk about that period and laugh at herself. “I think the podcast has really helped with that,” she said. She described its subject as people who had become known for one thing and were moving into something else. She and White were learning the practical work of hosting, too: booking guests, managing schedules and finding new perspectives to bring into the conversation.

She wrote a new project with Thera Close

Music continued alongside the podcast. In June 2024, Sonenclar described an EP she was writing with Thera Close. They had connected when Sonenclar wanted to take a break from moving between sessions and work closely with one writer. She said Close co-wrote the entire project with her. With one song excepted, she was making the project with one writer and one producer. Writing began during a relationship and continued after it ended. Sonenclar described the songs as following the course of that relationship, with the experiences happening during the work.

New podcast episodes and Real arrived in 2025

Ex Factors returned with an episode titled We Are SO Back on April 24, 2025. Sonenclar’s music also moved forward that year: “Because of You” arrived on May 2. The single was released under her performing name, Carly Rose. She and White hosted an Emblem3 episode on June 4, continuing their conversations with other performers. That episode ran for an hour and two minutes. On August 1, she released Real, an EP containing four songs with a total running time of 13 minutes.

• Carly Rose Sonenclar: career and music
• Listen to “Because of You” on Apple Music