Meet the Composer: Lin-Manuel Miranda

BACKGROUND

Lin-Manuel Miranda was born in 1980 in New York City. As a child, he spent at least one month every year in Puerto Rico, where his grandparents lived. In high school and college, he got involved in musical theater.  He began singing, acting, and writing musicals. A musical is play or a movie that has songs in it. While he was getting his start in theater and composing, he held various jobs, including high school teacher and newspaper columnist.  

He had his first big hit with a musical called In the Heights, followed by a musical called Hamilton. Both of those musicals include songs that have rapping in them. He has also composed a number of soundtracks for animated movies such as Moana and Encanto.  

He continues to write music and act in theater, movies, and television and has won many awards and prizes for work in all of these areas. Lin-Manuel Miranda has also started an organization that gives opportunities to artists of color. He has also been an advocate for hurricane relief in Puerto Rico. He currently lives in New York City with his family.  

MUSIC

1. Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first big hit was a musical called In The Heights. It told the story of a group of Puerto Rican immigrants living in a neighborhood of New York City called Washington Heights. The video below contains excerpts, or parts, of several songs from that musical. Notice rapping is mixed in with singing in parts. 

2. Alexander Hamilton was an important figure in Unites States history during the time when the United States was established as a country. Lin-Manuel Miranda became interested in the life of Alexander Hamilton after reading a book about him. He composed some short raps about Alexander Hamilton and eventually expanded on those to compose an entire musical. The video below features about a minute from one song in Hamilton, plus short clips of other scenes from the musical.  

3. The Disney movie Moana came out after Hamilton debuted, but Disney hired Lin-Manuel Miranda to write music for the film long before Hamilton’s success. Several people wrote music for Moana, but this song is by Lin-Manuel Miranda.  

4. When Hurricane Maria caused damage to the island of Puerto Rico in 2017, Lin-Manuel Miranda organized a group of musicians to record a song to raise money to help support Puerto Rico. The main lyric- “It’s almost like praying” - comes from a musical called West Side Story that featured many Puerto Rican characters. Most of the rest of the lyrics are the names of all of the towns on the island of Puerto Rico. Many of the artists in the official video have connections to Puerto Rico.  

CREATE, CONNECT & RESPOND

1. Musicals tell a story with words, music, and movements. Try telling a story with music using our Create a Musical Story lesson! 

2. Opera is another genre that’s very similar to musicals, since it tells a story onstage with singing. Learn more about opera, and make your own mini-opera, with our What is OPERA? lessons.