Luis Amaury Sánchez Lembert, known as Amaury Sánchez, is a Dominican conductor, arranger, composer and producer. He is the country’s leading producer of stage musicals and of symphonic concerts built around popular artists, and he has won nine awards from the Dominican critics’ association.

From the conservatory to the symphony

He was born in Santo Domingo in 1963 and studied percussion at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música, along with piano and classical guitar. In 1987 he joined the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional, where he spent some fifteen years and was appointed assistant conductor.

He completed conducting studies in Spain, New York and Chile. He has conducted the national symphony on several occasions, founded a philharmonic orchestra in Santo Domingo which he directs, and has appeared as guest conductor of the Arturo Somohano Philharmonic in Puerto Rico.

Musical theatre

He began producing large stage shows in the mid-nineties and moved into book musicals with La Novicia Rebelde and Jesucristo Superstar. In 2006 he produced Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, becoming the first Dominican to obtain the licence to stage it. The run filled the house fourteen times, and Music Theatre International extended his licence to the rest of Latin America, which took the production to the Teatro Teresa Carreño in Venezuela.

The list that followed covers most of the standard repertoire: Evita, Peter Pan, Cabaret, Annie, Cats, Cenicienta, Chicago, Dream Girls, El Mago de Oz, In the Heights and Little Shop of Horrors, alongside revues built on disco, the eighties and symphonic rock.

Composition

His own catalogue includes La Misa Festiva Dominicana and Fantasías Populares para Piano y Cuerdas, and scores for Dominican cinema, among them Cuatro Hombres y un Ataúd, Los Inmortales, Negocios Son Negocios and Mi Novia Está de Madre. He also wrote the symphonic arrangements for a live concert DVD by the Puerto Rican singer Danny Rivera.

The symphonic concerts

A distinct strand of his work sets popular singers in front of an orchestra. He produced Fernando Villalona Sinfónico, a concert with Fernando Villalona that was named concert of the year, and has staged similar programmes with visiting artists.

Teaching

He runs an academy of artistic training in which singers, dancers and musicians are prepared for the stage, and much of the cast of his productions has come through it.

Recognition

He has won nine awards from the Asociación de Cronistas de Arte, in categories covering arrangement, popular show, best musical and best concert, with a further twenty-three nominations. In 2002 he received a Jaycees award as an outstanding young Dominican.