User:Litrec/sandbox

Thea Alicia Cruz Litonjua (born 31 August 1997) also known as Alicia or professionally as Lesha (pronounced “lee-shuh”), is a Filipino singer-songwriter, record producer, and YouTuber. Born in Metro Manila, the capital and chief city of the Philippines, Lesha expressed interest in performing at her school's battle of the band competitions and local venues in her early teens. Her stage name Lesha was coined from her middle name Alicia in 7th grade. She started independently releasing her own music that gained her popularity as a singer on Soundcloud and YouTube. Lesha has won multiple talent competitions locally and internationally. Since 2018, she has independently released her EP "Two Faced", her singles "Bury", "Bite", and "Should've Known Better", and has performed for YouTube FanFest Manila 2019 at the SM Mall of Asia Arena. Her debut single “Ciao, Bella” under Star Music has received solid editorial support across Asia via music streaming service Apple Music, Spotify, India’s JioSaavn, and Taiwan’s KKBox.

Lesha’s music is primarily electropop and contains elements of alt-pop, synth-pop, and indie-pop.

Early Life
Alicia was born in Metro Manila, Philippines on August 31, 1997. She is the daughter of professional makeup artist, businesswoman, Liberty Litonjua, who also worked part-time as a fashion design teacher, and Mario Litonjua, businessman and owner of an Events and Integrated Marketing Communication Agency in the Philippines. She is of Taiwanese, Spanish, and Filipino descent. At a young age, her parents discovered her love for singing and performing so they enrolled her in voice, guitar, and dance classes every summer. She is the only one in the family who is musically inclined and her parents have always been supportive of her pursuing a career in the arts. Growing up, she was exposed to attending concerts because of her dad’s job being an event producer. She heavily looked up to Lady Gaga, Adam Lambert, Rihanna, Beyonce, and the Black Eyed Peas. Alicia was inspired to take up guitar classes after watching the movie School Of Rock and wrote her first song ever at 13 years old as a therapeutic solution to a traumatic bullying incident in high school. She began her weight loss journey, continued writing songs and started posting her song covers and originals on YouTube and Soundcloud. This opened more opportunities for her to collaborate with numerous producers all over the world.

Career
2015-2017: Songwriting, Music Production, & Content Creation

The summer before going to college, Lesha learned electronic music production and basic filmmaking by watching YouTube video tutorials. Lesha has always strived to become an inspiration to all through her music as she writes about real-life experiences and her unfiltered feelings. Through her music, she’s able to create her own space where she writes about certain feelings that people have a hard time explaining. She composes, arranges, and produces all of her original tracks and has collaborated with multiple international music producers. Her influences in music are Lorde, Billie Eilish, Marian Hill, Kimbra, Troye Sivan, and Lauv. Lesha has performed for numerous high-profile branded events in Metro Manila such as Guess, FujiFilm, Ray-Ban, Skechers, Levis, Krispy Kreme, Keds, Globe Telecom, SM Youth, and more. She opened for International artists, Bright Lights, and Kiiara live in Manila, and Filipino artists KZ Tandingan, Moira Dela Torre, Jessica Sanchez.

In 2016, Lesha bagged the Grand Prize for a local content creation competition held by Smart Communications, “Smart Launchpad” winning her a trip to Los Angeles.

Early 2017, Lesha released her single "Love You Better" and "Lies". In September, Lesha represented Asia and the Philippines in a YouTube Original Series “Best.Cover.Ever” hosted by Ludacris and produced by Ryan Seacrest. She won the grand prize for the episode and collaborated with Joe Jonas and his band DNCE in the show.

2018: Two Faced (EP) and Bury

In June 2018, Lesha independently released her EP “Two Faced” all tracks are written and produced by Lesha.

The release of her 7-track EP was shortly followed by her single with Australian rapper and producer riddo., “Bury”, in August. The song gained over half a million streams online and charted number 1 on Spotify's OPM Rising Playlist.

In September, Lesha was one of the twelve chosen YouTube creators and winners of YouTube NextUp Manila Class of 2018 where she was mentored by the likes of Mikee Bustos, Erwan Heussaf, and YouTube executives.

On New Year's Eve, Lesha headlined for the Countdown to 2019 Party of Bonifacio Global City in Taguig alongside James Reid, Nadine Lustre, KZ Tandingan, and Jessica Sanchez.

2019: Bite and Should've Known Better

Early 2019, Lesha independently released her single, "Bite" and a collaboration track "Should've Known Better" with her friend, singer-songwriter and record producer, Kio Priest.

In May, Lesha performed an all-original set at YouTube FanFest Manila at the SM Mall Of Asia Arena.

YouTube recognized Lesha as Creator On The Rise and was invited as a Mentor and Panelist for YouTube NextUp Manila Class of 2019.

In September, Lesha presented awards for the YouTube Ads Awards ceremony held at WhiteSpace Manila.

In November, she was awarded the Silver Play Button by YouTube for hitting 100,000 subscribers.

2020-present: Ciao, Bella

Lesha signed to Star Music and released her debut track under the label "Ciao, Bella" inspired by the Money Heist Series from Netflix. On May 15, 2020 Lesha’s self-penned track "Ciao, Bella" was instantly featured on eight of Spotify’s New Music Friday playlists: New Music Friday Philippines, New Music Friday Singapore, New Music Friday Indonesia, New Music Friday Malaysia, New Music Friday Taiwan, New Music Friday Hong Kong, New Music Friday Vietnam, and New Music Friday Thailand. A few days after release, Lesha was made the cover of Spotify's editorial playlist "OPM Rising" as her song got featured on it. Meanwhile, Apple Music highlighted the song on its homepage and OPM section. It also included it on "Absolute OPM" and "New Music Daily" playlists. Even iTunes featured it on its homepage as well. JioSaavn, an online music service based in India featured this captivating track on "Under the Radar Pop" playlist, while Taiwan-based music platform KKBOX also gave it a homepage banner.