The La Jolla Music Society concluded its 2025 four-week SummerFest with three works for chamber-sized orchestras. The first was Starburst for String Orchestra by Grammy Award winner Jessie Montgomery, composer-in-residence for this year’s festival. At a little over three minutes, the work is the shortest of the several of her works performed at the festival.

It is an ideal ear-opening curtain raiser, energetic and freshly modern sounding without abandoning tonality (Listen here on YouTube). Melodic fragments evoke the feeling of sparkling stars appearing suddenly in a clear night sky or sun rays rippling off a lake on a beautiful summer day.

The appropriately bright performance was played briskly with accurate intonation, precision, and warm string tones.