The Birth of TONTO Margouleff was an early customer, friend and collaborator of fellow New Yorker and music instrument pioneer
Robert Moog, contributing early insight toward Moog's musical instrument development for artists to routinely program and use
synthesizers. He also was an early creative resource at
Andy Warhol's
"factory", eventually co-producing
Ciao! Manhattan (1972), a semi-biographical
cult film tale of 1960s counterculture film actress and socialite
Edie Sedgwick, one of Warhol's "
superstars". In 1968, Robert Margouleff purchased a
Moog Series IIIc, which was intended to be the "first orchestra of synthesizers". He soon went on to meet well-known bassist
Malcolm Cecil, who approached him to learn more about this synthesizer. In exchange for Cecil teaching Margouleff how to use the recording console, Margouleff taught Cecil how to use the Moog. In just two weeks, the duo set to build the largest synthesizer in the world.
Stevie Wonder Beginning in 1972, Margouleff and Cecil worked with
Stevie Wonder on a string of award-winning albums, including
Music of My Mind (1972),
Talking Book (1972),
Innervisions (1973) and ''
Fulfillingness' First Finale'' (1974), all of which featured Margouleff and Cecil as associate producers, engineers and synthesizer programmers. TONTO was pivotal in the duo's relationship with Wonder because it allowed him to arrange his own tracks and to be involved in each step of the recording process. In 1980, Margouleff produced the
Freedom of Choice album for American
new wave band
Devo. On working with Margouleff, Devo's co-founder and principal songwriter
Gerald Casale said, "He just brought the right kind of tone and energy to the fact that we [were] using
mini-Moogs". In an interview for
Rhino Records, Casale described how Devo's demos for the album, which featured extensive usage of the Moog Bass, convinced Margouleff to work with them.
1995–present Margouleff is currently a partner in Safe Harbor Pictures LLC. in
Los Angeles,
California, where he has developed a fully tape-less 2D /
3D High definition production workflow, from shooting to editing. As an avid sailor and documentary filmmaker, Margouleff is producing
Tall Ships of the World, a 13-episode series about America's greatest sailing ships, which will be available on
Blu-ray in 3D. In 1997, Margouleff was a principal founder of Mi Casa Multimedia in
Hollywood, California, a leading boutique
surround sound (multi-channel audio) mixing studio specializing in home theatre
DTS and
DVD /
HD DVD releases for major motion picture studios. Mi Casa Multimedia studios is located in a former home of actor
Béla Lugosi. Margouleff was invited to present as the Keynote Speaker for the 129th
AES Convention on November 4, 2010, at the
Moscone Center in
San Francisco, California. His lecture was titled "What the Hell Happened?", which examined the influence of fast-paced technological developments on creativity in the music industry and the recording arts. In 2013, the
National Music Centre acquired TONTO. ==Personal life==