Margarita Mix Launches Entertainment Division

Broadening the scope of its business and offering  more services to its existing client base, Margarita Mix Santa Monica marks the opening of its new Entertainment Division. The company, which is the leading provider of high definition mixing, sound design, ISDNs and other audio services for commercials, will now provide those same services for long format media. The new division will service television networks, film studios and reality production companies, as well as interactive and long-form branded entertainment media produced by advertising agencies.

The new venture will be headed by producer and sales rep Whitney Warren, a Southern California native who joined the company four years ago and has stewarded award-wining projects for clients as diverse as  Coke and Sony PlayStation3. "Reality and scripted TV are becoming more demanding than ever about their audio, making it a natural for Margarita Mix to expand our work and roster of artistic mixers and sound designers,"  Warren said.

Margarita Mix has also brought on board audio artist Michael Jesmer, whose creative experience as a mixer for television and film, especially in the realm of reality TV, include E! Entertainment’s Party Monster, FX’s Operation MySpace and MTV Network’s Big in Japan. Jesmer will work in a 5.1 surround sound mixing studio equipped with a state-of-the-art ProTools system.

"Long format is a natural extension for Margarita Mix", notes General manager Michele Millard. "The growth in independent TV and film production on the Westside creates a great opportunity for us. Additionally, many of our advertising clients have begun to produce entertainment-style products for their clients, and this allows them to have their audio needs enhanced by a company they know and trust. There is increasing crossover between the advertising and entertainment worlds and in the audio zone, we are the link."

Margarita Mix has just wrapped up its first project under the new Entertainment Division, a video documentary series for insurance giant Liberty Mutual, engineered and mixed by Jesmer and industry icon Jimmy Hite, who has been with Margarita Mix since it opened its doors in 1991. The work,  a  phenomenal series about the power of the human spirit, can be viewed at www.libertymutual.com

Jesmer’s arrival at Margarita Mix is actually a return, as he began his career there as an assistant mixer in 2002. For the past two years, he has been on staff at reality TV specialist Bennett Productions, where he worked on series for ABC, HDNET, ION and others. In addition to mixing the shows, Jesmer was involved in production sound for several series including The 25th Miss Hawaiian Tropic International Model Search and the ION lifestyle series Men7.   He recently recorded Tori Spelling for her new book MommyWood and is currently working on a new series for the 2009 CBS TV season. 

"I like to bring out emotion and apply feature film mixing techniques to my work," Jesmer said. "I have a love for long format media where you get to replicate the natural world in sound to take a story from A to Z. As you can imagine, I have a lot of fun with what I do."

Margarita Mix is part of The LA Studios, the largest employee-owned audio post production company in the United States. Margarita Mix is located at 1661 Lincoln Blvd., Suite 101, Santa Monica, CA.