LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA  is an award-winning composer, lyricist, and performer as well as a 2015 MacArthur Foundation Award recipient. His current musical, Hamilton, opened on Broadway in 2015. Hamilton was awarded the 2016 Pulitzer Prize in Drama and earned a record-breaking 16 Tony Nominations, winning 11 Tony Awards. His first Broadway musical, In the Heights, received four 2008 Tony Awards (Best Orchestrations, Best Choreography, Best Musical), with Miranda receiving a Tony Award for Best Score. In the Heights also took home a 2009 Grammy Award for its Original Broadway Cast Album and was recognized as a finalist for the 2009 Pulitzer Prize in Drama. In 2016, Miranda won the Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in Music for the original London production of In The Heights. Off-Broadway, In the Heights received a Drama Desk award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance, the Lucille Lortel Award, and Outer Critic's Circle Award for Best Musical, and Miranda received an Obie Award for Outstanding Music and Lyrics. He is a recipient of the National Arts Club Medal of Honor and the ASCAP Foundation's Richard Rodgers New Horizons Award. He is a co-founder and member of Freestyle Love Supreme, a hip-hop improv group that has toured the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, as well as the Aspen, Melbourne, and Montreal Comedy Festivals and now performs in NYC. He received his B.A. from Wesleyan University and lives in NYC with his wife, son, and dog.