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.

Among all of the great performances of Wagner’s final opera, this performance of Parsifal from the stage of the Met has been for years one of the holy grails for Wagner enthusiasts, for until now, this broadcast had never been issued in its complete form. It represents the only time that Parsifal with the great Wagnerian duo, Kirsten Flagstad and Lauritz Melchior, was broadcast and preserved. It has none of the customary cuts that afflict other Wagner performances from this era with all cast members in excellent voice. The transfers were made from original discs recorded off the air by a New York recording studio, and we are proud to present this important performance for the first time. The two other principals are Friedrich Schorr and Emanuel List. During this time, the Metropolitan’s Wagner opera performances were conducted by Austrian conductor, Artur Bodanzky. But on this Good Friday, because of ill health, his doctors insisted that he conduct only the first and third acts; Act 2 is ably conducted by his then assistant, Erich Leinsdorf.

Our sponsorship goal is $16,000, the cost to remaster and manufacture this 4-CD set.

When we announced volume 1 of Raoul von Koczalski, we invited you to judge how Koczalski stacked up against other noted Chopin interpreters of the “golden age.” Why was he not better known? After all, in addition to his towering talent, one of Koczalski’s teachers was a student of Chopin. After years of requests for more of this extraordinary pianist and the emergence of new recordings, we are finally issuing volume 3 of this series.

The set begins with two recently discovered marvelous sides recorded for Homocord in 1930. We also are including four unpublished takes of 1938 Deutsche Grammophon recordings, held by a Berlin archive, which differ markedly from the issued versions on our second volume. Following these are twelve sides made in 1948 for the short-lived Polish label, MEWA, which had distribution only in Poland and today are rarely seen. The remainder of the set comprises performances from 1945 and 1948 recorded by German and Polish radio (although some of these have been available on two Polish CD issues, we have gone to original sources to achieve optimum sonic quality over the previous versions). Finally, there are also a number of stunning performances that have never been released, including Chopin’s Ballade No. 1 in G minor and Karl Tausig’s arrangement of Johan Strauss’s “Man lebt nur einmal.”

The booklet essay has been written by Jakub Puchalski, the Polish musicologist whose specialty is the study of pianists of the past. His essay explores the controversy surrounding Koczalski’s interpretations and discusses the pianist’s connection to Nazi Germany and his return to Poland after the Second World War.

Our sponsorship goal is $8,500, the cost to remaster and manufacturer this 3-CD set.

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.