9-year-old Pinay gets Golden Buzzer in 'America's Got Talent'

During a July 2017 broadcast of the television competition America’s Got Talent, a nine-year-old singer from Johns Creek named Angelica received the Golden Buzzer from guest judge Chris Hardwick. The selection, which took place during the first week of the Judges’ Cuts round, allowed her to bypass the standard elimination process and proceed directly to the live quarter-final shows.

For her performance, she sang the 2012 Alicia Keys song “This Girl Is on Fire.” This followed an earlier audition in which she sang “Rise Up” to advance in the competition, after which she spoke with the broadcaster 11Alive about her experience. Hardwick, a 45-year-old actor, comedian, and executive of Nerdist Industries, praised her vocal ability during the broadcast, questioning how such a voice could come from a young child.

According to her biographical details reported at the time, the singer began performing at two years old. At the age of four, she contracted a bacterial lung infection that developed into double pneumonia, and she later received a kidney transplant from her mother.

Under the rules of the Judges’ Cuts stage, twenty acts performed each week, with only seven selected by the judges to move on to the quarter-finals alongside those secured by a Golden Buzzer.