Leanne Amann, a group creative director at the New York office of Anomaly and an advertising creative with an ear for integrating music and sound into her work, has been named chairperson of the 2023 AMP Awards for Music & Sound. Amann will preside over the presentation of the AMP Awards, set to take place on May 22 at Sony Hall in New York.
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As Show chair, Amann will be tasked with helping assemble the AMP Awards Curatorial Committee, which will review the finalists in each category to ensure that they meet the competition’s criteria. She’ll also lead the committee’s deliberations, which results in the naming of one category winner as the Ryan Barkan Best in Show honoree.
A Texas native and graduate of the ad school at UT/Austin, Amann has spent most of her advertising career on the East and West Coasts. She was the lead creative on the 2022 AMP Awards Best in Show winner, “Keep Walking,” for Johnnie Walker, with music and sound created by Heavy Duty Projects. In addition to her current position at Anomaly, she’s also been on staff as a writer at Saatchi & Saatchi and JWT, both in New York, and has freelanced at such agencies as 180LA, Goodness Manufacturing and Butler Shine Stern & Partners. The list of brands she’s worked on includes Tanqueray, YouTube, YouTube Music, U by Kotex, MINI, Fruit Snacks and Miller Lite.
“Leanne represents a new generation of advertising creative leaders who are deeply in tune with music and sound and understand innately how it can impact the emotive quality of a piece of brand content,” said Carol Dunn, National Board president for the Association of Music Producers and executive producer for Human Worldwide. “The AMP Awards Committee was unanimous in their choice of her for our 2023 Show chair, and we look forward to working with the Curatorial Committee she’ll assemble to be the final arbiter of our winners.”
“Music has always been a passion for me,” Amann said, noting that she inherited much of her love of music from her father, who took her to a music store and to buy her first bass, guitar and amplifier when she expressed a desire to join her brother’s high school punk band. Her reaction to being named AMP Awards chair, she noted, brought about a mix of emotions: “I was humbled by it,” she said. “I’m normally not someone who cares all that much about winning awards, but to be associated with a show that’s all about music and sound is an honor. And it makes me think of my dad, because so much of my passion for music stems from him.”
Amann sees music and sound as a key element in creating work that stands out. “They’re powerful tools to communicate something in a way in which you’re not talking to somebody or at somebody but with somebody,” she observed. “Of all the things we have at our disposal, music and sound work on a visceral level–they conjure memories, emotions and deep gut reactions.
“Over the past few years I’ve been lucky enough to work on global projects, and many of these can’t rely on the English language, or heavy voiceover manifestos” she continued. “Music goes a long way to solve that. It’s a universal language, and always has been. We talk a lot about calls to action in advertising, but you can call people to action without using a word with music and sound.”
And being tapped to lead the curatorial process for a competition that digs deep into the role of music and sound is something she finds genuinely appealing. “In general, so much of the craft that goes into making something excellent gets attributed to a director or an agency, and as a result it isn’t talked about as much as it should be, or celebrated the way it should,” Amman said.
“A piece of music or sound design can defy your expectations and work on a sensory level, and I look at it the same way I look at cinematography, editing, direction or even concept,” she continued. “They all work together to achieve something great. So the more we talk about and recognize what makes it great, the more we can make things that are exciting and powerful.”
The AMP Awards, now in its 10th year, are open to music and sound design created or sourced for commercial release and commissioned by a client for TV, theater, the web, mobile devices or other media able to deliver in the moving image.
The only juried, non-profit advertising competition to focus on the unique contributions made to the industry by creators and producers of music and sound, the AMP Awards are judged by agency, label, publishing and music production professionals. Its Best in Show honor, named for the late music supervisor Ryan Barkan, will be selected by its Curatorial Committee, from among the top category winners.
