"For the Trumpet Will Sound!" was written for the Rooke Chapel Vocal Ensemble at Bucknell University. We only had one bass singer (and no tenors!) for an upcoming service due to another Bucknell ensemble having to travel that day, greatly outnumbered by the available soprano and alto singers. However, that male also happened to be a trumpeter. We programmed Paul Halley's "God Be Merciful Unto Us" but needed one more piece, so I took this opportunity to write something for the ensemble, implementing musical elements we needed to work on (shifting and less common time signatures, among other things).