00:00Thank you for having me. Wow. Give me one second. It's another notebook up here. Hi, everybody.
00:15What is a voice? Is it only sound? Or can a voice become a doorway? A mirror? A place where
00:24someone
00:24who has never seen themselves at the center of the dream finally does? Lea Salonga's voice
00:31has never been only a voice. It has been a doorway, a mirror, a home. There are singers
00:40who reach notes. Lea reaches hearts and souls. Through Jasmine and Mulan, she did more than
00:49give princesses their songs. She gave children who had been waiting outside the fairy tale
00:54away inside. Before many people knew how to speak about representation, Lea had already
01:01turned it into sound. Her voice told millions of children, you are not outside of the magic.
01:07You are within it. You are part of it. Long before Hollywood knew her name, a seven-year-old
01:14girl in the Philippines stepped on stage. The world did not know her yet, but purpose was
01:20already pronouncing her name. Her voice crossed oceans, conquered Broadway, made her the first
01:26Asian woman to win a Tony award, and made her a Disney legend. Give it up, y'all.
01:37Her history is filled with firsts, but first is not the deepest word in her story. The deepest
01:44word is after. Who could dream after her? Who could enter after her? Who could walk through
01:51because she left the doorway open? Lea did not merely become possibility. She made possibility
01:58contagious. A few weeks ago, I had the blessing of singing a whole new world beside her.
02:05And y'all, I have sung my entire life, but I could barely hold my own singing with this iconic
02:11woman. Okay? Because when Lea opened her mouth, I stopped being the singer beside her. I became a
02:20witness. The precision of her voice is extraordinary. Her range is astonishing. But the deepest measure of
02:29her gift is not the note she can reach. It is the truth she can carry. Her voice is what
02:38happens when
02:38discipline meets surrender. When technique becomes spirit. When a gift becomes grace. The world knows
02:46the gold in her voice. But I had the blessing of discovering the gold in her heart. I mean, to
02:51carry
02:51that much greatness and still make the person beside you feel completely seen, that is the rarest kind of
02:57power. Today, Lea becomes the first Filipina honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
03:08But this star is more than recognition. It is evidence. Evidence that where you begin can never limit how
03:15far your gift can travel. One day, a little Filipina girl will place her hand over Lea's name. And when
03:22she may never know every sacrifice it took for that star to be there, she will simply know that Lea
03:28belongs
03:28there. And because Lea belongs there, she may believe that she does too. That is what a trailblazer
03:35gives the world. What she once had to enter as impossible, the next generation inherits as belonging.
03:43Lea, your voice gave princesses their songs. Your courage gave generations a doorway. Your life gave the
03:50world proof. And your heart made the light warm enough for all of us to stand inside it. Hollywood
03:57is giving you a star today. But this star does not make you light because you were born light. It
04:04simply
04:04tells the ground what the sky has always known.
04:12Your name is beneath our feet. Your legacy is before us. And your light will always belong to the sky.
04:19I love you and I honor you. And congratulations, Lea.
