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Emacs does have a package to use tree-sitter [0]. I think emacs-lsp is aware of this highlighting backend and performs pretty well.

(semantic highlighting is pretty slow for C++ with font-lock, with tree-sitter it's a breeze :))

Wait what? You mean to tell me that Emacs LSP already uses tree-sitter?

Yeah but I don't think LSP specs contain syntax-highlighting or semantic highlighting.

Though AIUI the basic syntax highlighting is done by the editor (e.g. VSCode uses Textmate grammar support).

FYI there is tree-sitter.el for Emacs.