Michael Hearst is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, and writer. He is a founding member of the band One Ring Zero, which has released nine albums, including the literary collaboration As Smart As We Are (The Author Project), featuring lyrics by Paul Auster, Margaret Atwood, Dave Eggers, and Neil Gaiman, among others; Planets, a collection of new compositions to represent the solar system and beyond; and their most recent, The Recipe Project, in which the band has taken recipes from today’s top chefs (Mario Batali, Tom Colicchio, David Chang, etc.), set them to music, and sing them word for word. Michael's solo works include the albums Songs For Ice Cream Trucks and Songs For Unusual Creatures, the website Songs For Newsworthy News, and the soundtracks for the movies Magic Camp, The House Of Suh and The Good Mother. As a writer, Michael's work has appeared in such journals as McSweeney's, The Lifted Brow, and Post Road. His first children's book, Unusual Creatures, was recently published by Chronicle Books. Hearst also hosts a podcast series with Rick Moody called 18:59 and is a producer for the website Cassette From My Ex. He has performed and given lectures and workshops at universities, museums, and cultural centers around the world. He has toured with The Magnetic Fields, performed with The Kronos Quartet at Carnegie Hall, and has appeared on such shows as NPR's Fresh Air, A+E's Breakfast With The Arts, and NBC's The Today Show.