Bob DeMarco, Owner, Ability Productions
Influenced at an early age by classic rock, jazz and classical music, Bob DeMarco has experienced an impressive Hollywood music career, with a twist; he’s got heart and cares little for fame.
As a producer, composer, business leader and philanthropist, Bob DeMarco’s many accomplishments in music are uniquely and professionally impressive, however, it is his role as father – and specifically, as an autism dad – that eclipse his achievements over more than two-decades as a composer, musician and producer.
The father of 3; Christopher, 18, and 12 year old twins, Isabella and Dominic, DeMarco is a family man. When his son, Dominic was diagnosed with autism in 2006, DeMarco decided to leave his career in music to learn more about autism and how to work with his son. Soon after, he redirected his music career to include media and film production. This shift in DeMarco’s career has led to vital collaborations in music and media.
Currently, DeMarco serves on the Board of Directors of Spectrum Laboratory (www.speclabs.org) providing pro bono production services and studio space in his Camarillo recording studio. He works one-on-one and in groups with Spectrum Labs’ music and theater students to record, produce and support live and recorded theatrical productions.
Ongoing collaborations with The Art of Autism, an international collaboration of autistic artists, poets and bloggers (www.the-art-of-autism.com), has DeMarco providing the non-profit with film and production needs of international arts-related projects.
DeMarco is currently producing a feature documentary film, “A Sound Paradigm”, the story of an autistic microphone designer, Dave Royer and his rise to international success via the team that helped grow Royer Mics into a Grammy winning phenomenon in sound recording. DeMarco sees Royer’s story as not just the story of an engineering genius, but as the story of creating, building and sustaining possibilities and futures for people with autism and other intellectual disabilities.
In 2015, DeMarco’s collaboration with Social Thinking (Michelle Garcia Winner) resulted in co-production, mixing, mastering and lending guitars, bass, percussion and sound design to “My Hero Inside” (CD 2015).
Early History
After picking up a guitar at age 6, by his early teens he played professionally at clubs and venues throughout the East Coast. By age17, DeMarco had recorded in his first studio session, and was drawn to the Los Angeles music scene of the 80s. Heading West to study at the Musicians Institute where musicians dream big and graduate with mad technical skills, after graduation he went to work for guitar amp giant, Mesa Boogie where he consulted for such artists as Don Henley, Kenny Loggins, YES, John Fogerty, Rick Springfield, and more.
From 1986 – 1990 DeMarco was an independent session guitarist, songwriter and music producer while building a state-of-the-art home studio to keep up with the ever-growing onslaught of work coming his way. Projects included original scores for documentaries, indie films and television projects, including programming and writing music for The New Micky Mouse Club. Several seasons with Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera helped him hone his craft.
In 1994, he joined Paramount Domestic Television to compose music as a founding partner in Planet One Productions. Originally hired to contribute compositions for the TV program Hard Copy, the expanding demands for original scores increased, and from 1996 – 2001, Paramount brought the team on to shows including Entertainment Tonight, Real TV, Howie Mandell Show, and more.
During Planet One’s stint with Paramount, thousands of pieces of music were contributed to the TelePictures music library, which included placement on Ellen, The Bachelor, The Tyra Banks Show and TMZ, and included the ever-catchy theme song for Extra.
After disbanding Planet One in 2001, DeMarco continued writing for Paramount (now CBS Television), generating custom libraries for Entertainment Tonight, Dr. Phil, Rachel Ray, and The Insider.
In all, over 18,000 pieces of music written since 1994 were compiled to form the “CBS Television Music Library,” serving all CBS-related productions including CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Inside Edition, Swift Justice with Nancy Grace, The Talk and other popular television shows.DeMarco and his team are responsible for more hours of TV music than any other individual or company to date.
In 2011, after 16 ½ years, DeMarco, ready to seek out new and more challenging opportunities, created the “Raise Hope Foundation” to raise autism awareness via multi-media educational materials.