In an effort to meet the needs of the Marston customer, we have chosen our upcoming releases with you in mind. We press only 1000 copies of most releases and do not repress so “when they’re gone, they’re gone.” To date, more than a 1/3 of our catalogue is out of print!

Listed below are a number of projects which are at various stages of completion. When a set is approaching release (within two months of becoming available), it will go on sale through the website. Your credit card will be charged when the order is placed, and the CDs will be shipped as soon as they are in our hands. "Pre-ordering" this way will guarantee that you are not left out in the cold! Check back regularly for updates on the status of future projects.

Elisabeth Rethberg was one of the most highly-regarded sopranos of the decades between the world wars. For twenty years, her silvery spinto voice captivated Metropolitan Opera audiences, and her records were major staples in the Brunswick and Victor catalogues.

Born Lisbeth Sättler in Schwarzenberg, Germany, her earliest musical education was with her father who was a music teacher.  At sixteen, she began studying voice and piano at the Dresden Royal Conservatory. Her debut took place at the Dresden Opera in 1915, as Arsena in Johann Strauss’s Der Zigeunerbaron opposite the rising tenor, Richard Tauber. The following year, she was entrusted with the Countess in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro and Eva in Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. In 1919 She sang the Empress in Richard Strauss’s Die Frau ohne Schatten in the Dresden premiere, and nine years later sang the leading role in the world premiere of Strauss’s Die ägyptische Helena.

Rethberg’s Metropolitan Opera debut came in 1922 as Verdi’s Aida. She soon took up residence in New York and joined the Met where she remained for twenty years. There she performed thirty roles by Verdi, Mozart, and Wagner. She often returned to Europe to sing at La Scala, Covent Garden, and The Salzburg Festival.

Rethberg’s first group of records were made in Berlin between 1920 and 1922 for the Lindstrom company, appearing on their Odeon label. She returned to the company in 1931 and 1933 to record several additional selections. These recordings have never been reissued complete and are included here for the first time. This set includes all of her recordings for Brunswick, Victor, and the Gramophone company, with the notable addition of six previously unpublished Brunswick records remastered from the singer’s own test pressings. The set concludes with three selections recorded by the Bell Telephone Laboratory and two appearances on the Magic Key of RCA radio program in 1937.

During the Philadelphia Orchestra’s 1931–1932 season, Bell Telephone Laboratories’ engineers were invited by Leopold Stokowski, the orchestra’s forward-looking conductor, to set up an experimental recording station in the cellar of the orchestra’s home, the Academy of Music, to try out new developments in improving recording technology. The historic results mark the first attempts of what we now know as high-fidelity recordings, represent the earliest experiments to record in stereo, and include repertoire that Leopold Stokowski and the orchestra did not record commercially. The sound was stunning when compared with the orchestra’s commercial records of that time.

Bell Laboratories preserved many of the discs made during these concerts, and in 1979 the orchestra issued two long-playing records containing highlights from these experiments. Additional material from the Bell Labs experiments were issued by the orchestra in their 1999 centennial CD set. These productions were remastered by Ward Marston and are highly prized by collectors. Yet, many of the discs Bell recorded have remained unheard. In 2025 Marston Records will be producing a four-CD boxed set containing all extant recordings using the latest digital restoration tools, including new improved restorations of all previously issued material.

(It should be noted that the time limitations of recording on single discs prevented the recording of complete works, but since recordings were made during Friday and Saturday concerts, it is possible to assemble complete performances of some of the music including Beethoven’s fifth and Haydn’s 88th symphony, and extended excerpts from two all-Wagner concerts.)

Due to the nature of the discs, Ward has devoted a tremendous amount of engineering time to preserve these important artifacts. We are pleased that a Philadelphia Orchestra donor has provided a lead gift to cover Ward’s time, but for those interested in this important project, additional contributions would be tremendously appreciated to defray the extensive production costs. Our sponsorship goal is $18,000, the cost to remaster and manufacturer this 4-CD set.

At the turn of the 20th century, Ernest Reyer and Édouard Lalo had experienced a certain degree of fame. Reyer’s opera Sigurd was still active in the repertory of many French opera houses including the Paris Opera, and although less popular, Maître Wolfram, La statue, and Salammbô were performed and also occasionally recorded. In the early years of recording, the most popular arias from Sigurd became staples of record company catalogs especially with the tenor arias being recorded by the likes of Scaramberg, Affre, Lafitte, Franz, and Vezzani.

Édouard Lalo, who today is best known for his Symphonie Espagnole for violin and orchestra, composed one opera that was immensely popular during the last decade of the nineteenth century and the first three decades of the twentieth: Le roi d’Ys. The “Aubade” from Act 3, “Vainement, ma bien aimée” was one of the most popular and ubiquitously recorded of all French tenor arias, ranking with the flower song from Carmen and “Plus blanche” from Les Huguenots.

This set devoted to Reyer and Lalo will feature at least one recording of each excerpt that was recorded between 1902 and 1930 and will feature approximately 35 singers. The booklet will contain: essays on the life and works of these two composers by Vincent Giroud; plot summaries of their operas; and short biographical sketches of the singers.

This set is fully funded.