It’s happening all around the world: train stations, shopping malls, and local governments have found themselves forced to turn to classical music in their efforts to keep loiterers at bay. As the Los Angeles Times reports, “Whether it’s Handel piped into New York’s Port Authority or Tchaikovsky at a public library in London, the sound of classical music is apparently so repellent to teenagers that it sends them scurrying away like frightened mice.” When Gil Shaham – hailed by Time magazine as “the outstanding American violinist of his generation” – heard the news he combed the catalog of his recording label, Canary Classics, to create Music to Drive Away Loiterers, the perfect compilation to deter anyone! A timely release in the U.S. on April 1.

The 1930s was an incredibly rich decade for the violin concerto, thriving on what was the uncertainty of the age. Over 30 violin concertos materialized across the decade. Stravinsky and Berg’s through to Barber’s and Britten’s concertos all commanding iconic status within the violinist’s repertory.

Pianist Orli Shaham has established an impressive international reputation as one of today’s most gifted soloists and is in demand for her prodigious skills and admired for her interpretations of both standard and modern repertoire.

It has long been a dream of Orli Shaham’s to make a statement with American piano music. For Shaham, the composers John Adams and Steven Mackey ‘are at the forefront of defining what it means to be an American pianist today.’