Katrina Velarde

Katrina together with her friends Alyssa Quijano and Jennifer Maravilla formed the group New Born Divas to join the second season of Talentadong Pinoy, one of the most popular reality talent shows of its time. After posting consecutive wins, the group was named the 11th Hall of Famer.

After New Born Divas disbanded, she joined The X Factor Philippines season 1 as a solo act. She sang "Dangerously in Love" by Beyoncé and got four yeses from the judges. On her bootcamp performance, Velarde sang (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman by Aretha Franklin. After that audition, the judges called the names of Velarde, Alyssa Quijano, Auriette Divina, Monique Lualhati, Jhelsea Flores and Ashley Campbell to inform them that they were chosen as the last act in groups category that made it to the Top 20 and it was mentored by Gary Valenciano.[6] At the judges' home visit, A.K.A. J.A.M. performed Seasons of Love by the cast of Rent the musical and made it to the top 12. On the first week of their live show, their group performed Got to Be Real by Cheryl Lynn. On the second week, they performed This Is My Life (La vita) by Shirley Bassey. On the third week of their live show performance, A.K.A. J.A.M. performed Survivor by Destiny's Child. Unfortunately, their group didn't make it to the next level after losing to Daddy's Home via text votes of 4.42% and 5.53%, respectively.[7]

After she uploaded a video of herself singing Dangerously In Love 2 by Beyoncé while holding a plastic comb as her microphone, netizens started calling her Suklay Diva (Comb Diva). It went viral after catching the attention of the netizens and started to gain international fame through social media.[8] Her video went viral after Chris Brown and Beyoncé's guitarist Bibi McGill shared it on social media from worldstarhiphop.com and became a female talent of the week.[9] Because of her viral video. Katrina Velarde got an invitation to showcase her talent on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.[10] A segment that open its door for Filipino singer and internet sensation like Charice Pempengco. But due to her Bell's palsy condition, Katrina turned down the offer.

Velarde became part of TV5's weekly drama series "Trenderas" with Isabella de Leon and Lara Maigue where she played the role of Diva Salambangon. Her natural wit and sense of humor brought her to nomination at the 2015 Golden Screen Awards as Outstanding Breakthrough Performance by an Actress. In 2015, she also played a main role in TV5's Wattpad presents #Bitterella. Because of her passion in singing, she received a lot of opportunities that made her as one of the successful divas in her generation. Katrina had a chance to showcase her talent on Wish 107.5 Bus YouTube channel singing her rendition of Go The Distance by Michael Bolton and gained millions of views after a week.[11] Because of her ability to imitate local and international singers, she started to upload a video of her song covers that became popular to some foreign reactors on YouTube.[12]

In October 2018, Katrina performed in the 2018 Philippine Popular Music Festival, an annual songwriting competition organized by the Philpop MusicFest Foundation. She interpreted "Tama Na",[13] an original song written by Michael Rodriguez & Jeanne Columbine Rodriguez which was chosen as one of the 10 finalists but the song did not place in the competition. Velarde sang theme songs for VIVA films "Magkaibang Mundo", the Original Sound Track of the movie Just A Stranger starring Anne Curtis and Marco Gumabao. Followed by "Isang Himala" from the box office movie Miracle in Cell No. 7 (2019 Philippine film) written by Miguel Mendoza.

In 2019, during the interview of Martin Nievera for his upcoming concert together with Lani Misalucha, he revealed that Katrina Velarde also offered to represent the Philippines to compete at The World's Best, a reality talent competition that features international performers. On the other hand, she declined the offer because she wanted to focus on her son that's why TNT Boys got into it. Katrina released her first album "Sikat Ako".[14] The title of her album was based on her first solo major concert. Due to its success, it follows her 2nd major solo concert "SiKat i2".[15]

She later joined Masked Singer Pilipinas 2020 as DIWATA where she became 1st runner up over Daryl Ong. Her successful journey from that contest made her as a judge on a reality singing competition Born to Be a Star.

Katrina has often been referred to as "Asia's Vocal Supreme"[16][17] as she represents the Philippines in the Firdaus Holiday Experience at Expo City Dubai last December 2022 with the Firdaus Orchestra together with other international artists. She performed her single "Isang Himala", the official soundtrack of the box office movie Miracle in Cell No. 7 (2019 Philippine film), "Hindi Tayo Pwede" from The Juans[18] and "Pasko Na Sinta Ko" by Gary Valenciano.